Research
Click the silhouettes to see what the experts say about inferring.
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"The data suggest that text comprehension is enhanced when readers actively relate the ideas represented in print to their
own knowledge and experience and construct mental representations in memory."
—Report of the National Reading Panel
(National Reading Panel, 2000, p. 14)
—Report of the National Reading Panel
(National Reading Panel, 2000, p. 14)
To make an inference, a reader must combine a number of pieces of information from a text. They must "read between the lines" and think about what may be only suggested
or hinted at in a selection. Sometimes the most important "take" from a piece of text is on an inferential level.
To infer as we read is to go beyond literal interpretation and to open a world of meaning deeply connected to our lives.
"It helps me understand the humor, and that helps me understand how characters are feeling. I'm part of the book."
Inferring is the bedrock of comprehension, not only in reading. We infer in many realms. Our life clicks along more smoothly if we can read the world as well as text.
When we read, we stretch the limits of the literal text by folding our experience and belief into the literal meanings in the text, creating a new interpretation, an inference.