My main research interest is in the area of language comprehension. I am especially interested in representational issues such as the exact nature of the different kinds of representations that are constructed during the comprehension process, and the way particular types of linguistic expressions are represented at these different representational levels. My current research focusses on the following questions:

• How is negated text information processed, represented and interpreted during language comprehension (Emmy Noether Research Group on the Psycholinguistics of Negation).
• How are language comprehension and production processes related to action and perception? In other words, in what sense are the representations constructed in language comprehension embodied? (together with Rolf Zwaan, Florida State University)
• Does the discourse model have an impact on early comprehension processes such as word recognition? (together with Don Foss, Florida State University, and Matthew Traxler, University of South Carolina).
• How does the human mind represent entities that are denoted by plural expressions (e.g., "the houses", "most children", "they")? (together with Stephanie Kelter, Berlin University of Technology).
• How are inconsistencies processed during text comprehension? (together with Don Foss, Florida State University).
• How is temporal text information represented at the non-linguistic level of representation, and are the representations constructed at this representational level dynamic in nature? (together with Stephanie Kelter & Berry Claus, Berlin University of Technology).

I am also interested in autobiographical memory. In a joint project with Katinka Dijkstra (Florida State University) we are currently conducting a study in which we compare different methods for cuing autobiographical memories.