Most successful models of inflation in supergravity have a shift symmetry for
the inflaton and contain a stabilizer field coupled to the inflaton in a
particular way. We argue that the natural interpretation of the stabilizer,
from the viewpoint of the shift symmetry, is a three-form multiplet. Its
coupling to the inflaton is uniquely determined by the shift symmetry and the
invariance under three-form gauge transformations and has a natural string
theory interpretation.Comment: 15 pages, references adde
