e is interpreted as an anatomical object falling off a shelf. However, if the subject is “eye drops” than we learn that a product has been removed from the shelf. The anatomical interpretation is suggested by the frequency of the two choices. We are more often exposed to the word “eye” on it’s own then “eye drops”. Most learn the anatomical reference to “eye” as very young children. However, the phrase “eye drops” doesn’t even enter our vocabulary until much later. Therefore, it is much more reasonable that “eye” by itself is the more frequent occurrence. We are most likely to adopt the second interpretation led by plausibility. The product being taken off the shelf is much more plausible, it is easy to imagine a product being recalled due to safety reasons etc. However, it is incredibly unlikely that a piece of a person’s anatomy would fall off the shelf. The context of the phrase also leads us to adopt the second interpretation. The use of the word “drops” rather than “falls” or even “rolls” also leads us to take the second interpretation. Semantic priming studies have suggested that we access one particular definition of a word more readily if a related word is shown first, therefore it is likely that we would access the liquid definition of drops after hearing “eye”."All-Stars turn on sparse crowd" The ambiguity in this example is based on whether "turn" or "turn on" is the action being taken. In the first case the headline is taken to mean that the all-stars in question turned against the crowd. In the second case the all-stars are understood to excite the crowd. Both context and plausibility support the second interpretation. The context in which a group of humans is taking the action indicates that it is unlikely that the attack interpretation of "turn" is the right one. However, if the co...
