This book provides an up-to-date, in-depth treatment of the major issues, theories and findings in language understanding. It introduces a representative selection of different research methods and the reader is encouraged, by means of activities and self-assessment questions, to become an active participant in cognitive psychology. In particular, the student is introduced to language understanding by working through actual problems and so is able to test and develop theoretical frameworks by 'hands-on' experience. The first edition of this book established itself as an accessible, contemporary introduction to language understanding. This second edition has been extensively rewritten to take account of the latest research developments in the subject.

It is divided into three parts, each of which introduces a different approach to language understanding. Part I emphasises the enormous amount of knowledge required to understand what we hear and read. Part II concentrates on the linguistic processes which underlie language use, and the models which seek to explain them. Part III, which is entirely new, addresses these issues in the area of anaphoric reference (which describes how language users understand the links between pronouns and other words in a sentence). Finally, the overview provides a commentary highlighting the many problematic issues involved in studying language.

Reviews of the first edition:

'Greene's Language Understanding is in a similar mould-breaking vein. The dependence of the psychology of language on linguistics has often made introductory texts appear very remote from psychological concerns. It is this imbalance which Greene redresses.'

British Journal of Psychology