Response demands and the recruitment of heuristic strategies in syllogistic reasoning

Two experiments investigated whether dealing with a homogeneous subset of syllogisms with time-constrained responses encouraged participants to develop and use heuristics for abstract (Experiment 1) and thematic (Experiment 2) syllogisms. An atmosphere-based heuristic accounted for most responses with both abstract and thematic syllogisms. With thematic syllogisms, a weaker effect of a belief heuristic was also observed, mainly where the correct response was inconsistent with the atmosphere of the premises. Analytic processes appear to have played little role in the time-constrained condition, whereas their involvement increased in a self-paced, unconstrained condition. From a dual-process perspective, the results further specify how task demands affect the recruitment of heuristic and analytic systems of reasoning. Because the syllogisms and experimental procedure were the same as those used in a previous neuroimaging study by Goel, Buchel, Frith, and Dolan (2000), the result also deepen our understanding of the cognitive processes investigated by that study.     

Confidence judgments in syllogistic reasoning: the role of consistency and response cardinality

In two experiments, we examined the resolution of confidence judgments in syllogistic reasoning and their heuristic bases. Based on the assumptions of Koriat's Self-Consistency Model of confidence, we expected the confidence judgments to be related to conclusion consensuality, reflecting the role of consistency as a heuristic cue to confidence. In Experiment 1, the participants evaluated 24 syllogisms with conclusions that varied with respect to validity and consensuality. In Experiment 2, the participants produced conclusions to 64 pairs of premises. The correlation between confidence and reasoning accuracy was low. In both experiments confidence was related to the consensuality of the responses. For consensually correct items, correlation between confidence and accuracy was positive; however, for consensually incorrect items it was negative. In Experiment 2, confidence was lower for syllogisms with higher response cardinality, or syllogisms that elicited a greater variety of conclusions.     

Phonological and visual distinctiveness effects in syllogistic reasoning: Implications for mental models theory

Two experiments are reported in which the representational distinctiveness of terms within categorical syllogisms was manipulated in order to examine the assumption of mental models theory that abstract, spatially based representations underpin deduction. In Experiment 1, participants evaluated conclusion validity for syllogisms containing either phonologically distinctive terms (e.g., harks, paps, and fids) or phonologically nondistinctive terms (e.g., fuds, fods, and feds). Logical performance was enhanced with the distinctive contents, suggesting that the phonological properties of syllogism terms can play an important role in deduction. In Experiment 2, participants received either the phonological materials from Experiment 1 or syllogisms involving distinctive or nondistinctive visual contents. Logical inference was again enhanced for the distinctive contents, whether phonological or visual in nature. Our findings suggest a broad involvement of multimodal information in syllogistic reasoning and question the assumed primacy of abstract, spatially organized representations in deduction, as is claimed by mental models theorists.     

Transfer of conditional reasoning: Effects explanations and initial problem types

Transfer of reasoning on Wason's (1966) selection task was explored in three experiments. Experiment 1 tested the effects of problem explanations and verbalization instructions on transfer from abstract or thematic problems to abstract problems. Explanations facilitated transfer only when the initial problems were abstract; verbalization did not produce transfer between problems. Experiment 2 explored the effects of problem similarity and explanations on transfer between problems. Although transfer occurred following explanations, no effect of similarity was found for thematic problems. In both of these experiments, the thematic effect (Wason & Shapiro, 1971) was observed. Experiment 3 examined the effects of explanations to abstract or thematic problems on transfer to subsequent abstract or thematic problems. Transfer of reasoning occurred from both initial problem types, particularly to problems of the same type; however, transfer occurred to a greater extent from abstract problems than from thematic problems. The results are discussed in terms of problem similarity and Cheng and Holyoak's (1985) pragmatic reasoning schema hypothesis.     

Individual differences in working memory capacity and resistance to belief bias in syllogistic reasoning

In two experiments, we investigated the possibility that individual differences in working memory capacity (WMC) would provide resistance to belief bias in syllogistic reasoning. In Experiment 1 (N?=?157), participants showed a belief bias effect in that they had longer response times and decreased accuracy on syllogisms with conflict between the validity and believability of the conclusion than on syllogisms with no such conflict. However, this effect did not differ as a function of individual differences in WMC. Experiment 2 (N?=?122) replicated this effect with the addition of decontextualized (i.e., nonsense) syllogisms as a different means of measuring the magnitude of the belief bias effect. Although individual differences in WMC and fluid intelligence were related to better reasoning overall, the magnitude of the belief bias effect was not smaller for participants with greater WMC. The present study offers two novel findings: (a) The belief bias effect is independent of individual differences in WMC and fluid intelligence, and (b) resolving conflict in verbal reasoning is not a type of conflict resolution that correlates with individual differences in WMC, further establishing boundary conditions for the role of WMC in human cognitive processes.     

The belief-bias effect in formal reasoning: The influence of knowledge on logic

The present study examines the applicability of a rational model of categorical inference (e.g., Revlis, 1975b) to account for the apparently irrational decisions students reach on categorical syllogisms. In Experiment 1, students judged the logical validity of emotionally neutral conclusions to controversial premises. Of the reasoners’ decisions, 80% can be accounted for by the application of rational rules to their idiosyncratic encoding of the syllogistic premises. In Experiment 2, students were asked to solve syllogisms whose conclusions varied in truth value. When asked to reason about controversial, if not emotional, material, students do not suspend rational choice, but rather, their decisions are judicious ones, flowing logically from their idiosyncratic understanding of the materials reasoned about. When errors do occur, they result from an interrupt to rational processes and reflect conflict between competing goals rather than a switch to irrational decision processes.     

Reasoning with conditionals containing negated constituents.

Three experiments investigated matching bias in conditional reasoning tasks. Matching bias occurs when Ss ignore negations and match named items. Experiment 1 used an abstract and a thematic version of Evans's (1972) construction task. Results showed that matching may be due to an interaction between task demands and constructing contrast classes when interpreting negations. Experiment 2, which used Wason's (1968) selection task, introduced a manipulation to ease contrast-class construction. Confirmation plus falsification dominated over matching. Experiment 3 introduced two other manipulations to aid contrast-class construction with abstract material. Confirmation was facilitated, matching was suppressed, and falsification remained unchanged. These results suggest that matching occurs only when insufficient or ambiguous information prevents the intended interpretation of negations.     

Facilitation and transfer with narrative thematic versions of the THOG task

This article reports two experiments investigating the use of narrative form in the presentation of thematic versions of Wason's (1977) THOG problem. Experiment 1 demonstrated that narrative thematic versions that use actions of characters to present the elements of the problem are easier to solve than the classic version. This result was found both for a problem that used thematic examples and for a problem that used the same geometric figures as the classic THOG. Results also suggested that the presence of a character who creates the comparison properties to be used in applying the disjunction rule was useful in separating those properties from the properties of the positive example. Experiment 2 demonstrated that the solution of a narrative thematic version of the THOG could lead to improved performance on the classic abstract THOG, but only when the examples in the narrative version were the geometric figures. Issues of transfer with the THOG problem are discussed.     

Modulation of taxonomic (versus thematic) similarity judgments and product choices by inducing local and global processing

Perceived similarity is influenced by both taxonomic and thematic relations. Assessing taxonomic relations requires comparing individual features of objects whereas assessing thematic relations requires exploring how objects functionally interact. These processes appear to relate to different thinking styles: abstract thinking and a global focus may be required to explore functional interactions whereas attention to detail and a local focus may be required to compare specific features. In four experiments we explored this idea by assessing whether a preference for taxonomic or thematic relations could be created by inducing a local or global perceptual processing style. Experiments 1–3 primed processing style via a perceptual task and used a choice task to examine preference for taxonomic (versus thematic) relations. Experiment 4 induced processing style and examined the effect on similarity ratings for pairs of taxonomic and thematically related items. In all cases processing style influenced preference for taxonomic/thematic relations.     

The difference between implicit and explicit associative processes at study in creating false memory in the DRM paradigm

The effects of implicit and explicit associative processes for false recognition were examined by manipulating exposure duration of studied items; 20 ms or 2000 ms. Participants studied lists of words that were high associates to a nonpresented word (critical lure) in either condition. After learning each list, they took a recognition test and remember/know judgements immediately (Experiment 1) or 1 minute later (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, know responses for critical lures were more in the 20 ms than in the 2000 ms conditions, while remember responses for them were more in the 2000 ms condition. Implicit associative processes create familiarity of critical lures, and explicit associative processes create details of false memories. Comparing the results of Experiment 1 with those of Experiment 2, remember responses for critical lures were increased with the prolonged time only in the 20 ms condition. Characteristics of false memory made by implicit associative processes could be changed by prolonged time.     

The difference between implicit and explicit associative processes at study in creating false memory in the DRM paradigm

The effects of implicit and explicit associative processes for false recognition were examined by manipulating exposure duration of studied items; 20 ms or 2000 ms. Participants studied lists of words that were high associates to a nonpresented word (critical lure) in either condition. After learning each list, they took a recognition test and remember/know judgements immediately (Experiment 1) or 1 minute later (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, know responses for critical lures were more in the 20 ms than in the 2000 ms conditions, while remember responses for them were more in the 2000 ms condition. Implicit associative processes create familiarity of critical lures, and explicit associative processes create details of false memories. Comparing the results of Experiment 1 with those of Experiment 2, remember responses for critical lures were increased with the prolonged time only in the 20 ms condition. Characteristics of false memory made by implicit associative processes could be changed by prolonged time.     

The effect of feedback on children’s metacognitive judgments: a heuristic account

In three experiments, we investigated whether the feedback effect on the accuracy of children’s metacognitive judgments results from an improvement in monitoring processes or the use of the Anchoring-and-Adjustment heuristic. Experiment 1 revealed that adding feedback increased the accuracy of young children’s (aged 4, 6, and 8 years) memory prediction. In Experiment 2, the influence of an external anchor on children’s metacognitive judgment was established. Finally, in Experiment 3, two memory tasks that differed in terms of difficulty were administered. Participants were randomly assigned to an anchoring (high/low/no anchor) and a feedback (feedback/no feedback) condition. Results demonstrated that children in the feedback condition adjusted their predictions toward the feedback, regardless of the task’s difficulty. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that external information provided by feedback is used as an anchor for judgment. This interpretation is strengthened by the correlation found between the two scores computed to assess participants’ susceptibility to anchoring and feedback effects, which indicates that children who are more sensitive to the anchoring effect are also more sensitive to the feedback effect.     

Content and strategy in syllogistic reasoning.

Syllogistic reasoning has been investigated as a general deductive process (Johnson-Laird & Byrne, 1991; Revlis, 1975; Rips, 1994). However, several studies have demonstrated the role of cognitive strategies in this type of reasoning. These strategies focus on the method used by the participants (Ford, 1995; Gilhooly, Logie, Wetherick, & Wynn, 1993) and strategies related to different interpretations of the quantified premises (Roberts, Newstead, & Griggs, 2001). In this paper, we propose that content (as well as individual cognitive differences) is an important factor in inducing a certain strategy or method for syllogistic resolution. Specifically, we suggest that syllogisms with a causal conditional premise that can be extended by an agency premise induce the use of a conditional method. To demonstrate this, we carried out two experiments. Experiment 1 provided evidence that this type of syllogism leads participants to draw the predicted conditional conclusions, in contrast with control content syllogisms. In Experiment 2, we demonstrated that the drawing of conditional conclusions is based on a causal conditional to an agent representation of the syllogism premises. These results support the role of content as inducing a particular strategy for syllogistic resolution. The implications of these results are discussed.     

“Pushing the Button While Pushing the Argument”: Motor Priming of Abstract Action Language

In a behavioral study we analyzed the influence of visual action primes on abstract action sentence processing. We thereby aimed at investigating mental motor involvement during processes of meaning constitution of action verbs in abstract contexts. In the first experiment, participants executed either congruous or incongruous movements parallel to a video prime. In the second experiment, we added a no‐movement condition. After the execution of the movement, participants rendered a sensibility judgment on action sentence targets. It was expected that congruous movements would facilitate both concrete and abstract action sentence comprehension in comparison to the incongruous and the no‐movement condition. Results in Experiment 1 showed a concreteness effect but no effect of motor priming. Experiment 2 revealed a concreteness effect as well as an interaction effect of the sentence and the movement condition. The findings indicate an involvement of motor processes in abstract action language processing on a behavioral level.     

Individual differences in working memory strategies for reading expository text

This study investigated whether individual differences in working memory (WM) span are associated with different WM management strategies during the reading of expository text. In Experiment 1, probe questions were presented on line during reading to determine whether thematic information was maintained in WM throughout comprehension. The data indicated that readers across the range of WM span maintained thematic information in WM throughout the reading of a given passage. In Experiment 2, sentence reading times and accuracy for both topic and detail questions were measured in two conditions: when topic sentences were present and when topic sentences were absent. Subjects performed similarly across the range of WM span in the topic-present condition, but lower span subjects performed more poorly on detail questions in the topic-absent condition. In Experiment 3, the topic-present condition of the second experiment was replicated, except that subjects expected to receive questions about details only. Thematic processing and retention of topic and detail information all increased with span. Taken together, these results suggest that, for more difficult text processing tasks, high- and low-span subjects adopt different WM management strategies and these strategies influence what is learned from reading the text.     

Context and rule manipulations on the Wason selection task

‘Food and drinks’ is a thematic content known not to produce differential performance to abstract content on the Wason selection task. To examine the effects of context on problem responses, this content was set in a ‘diet’ context, predicted to produce differential performance, and this context was compared both with the ‘food and drinks’ presentation previously used and with abstract content. Additionally, both conditional and universal rules were used, producing six cells to the design, 12 subjects being tested in each cell. Results revealed a significant difference between the rules (in the form a rule by content interaction), content having a significant effect only when the conditional rules were used. For these rules, subjects made significantly more correct solutions in the diet condition than in the abstract condition, whereas there was no evidence of differential performance between the (other) thematic and the abstract condition. Although it is admitted that no satisfactory explanation of the rule differences seems apparent, the effect of context observed is encouraging for this line of research. It is concluded that, as subjects are shown to be capable of coding the general idea of a counter-example into relevant specific selections, they are quite capable of solving the task, but that they fail to do so unless the solution is cued by, and its outcome would be consistent with, their pre-existing belief structures.     

Locus of inhibition in the masked priming of response alternatives

Masked prime stimuli presented immediately before target stimuli in a choice reaction task give rise to behavioral costs when the primes and the target stimuli are mapped to the same response and result in benefits when they are mapped to opposite responses. Researchers assume that this negative compatibility effect reflects inhibitory processes in the control of perceptuomotor links. The authors investigated whether the inhibition operates at the level of abstract central codes or at effector-specific motor stages. In 2 experiments (N = 8 participants in each), left or right hand or foot responses were required to target stimuli that were preceded by masked arrow primes mapped to the same response side as the target stimuli in compatible trials and to the opposite response side in incompatible trials; the primes were irrelevant in neutral trials. In Experiment 1, when the masked primes determined both response side and modality, there was no transfer of negative compatibility effects across response modalities. That finding is inconsistent with a central abstract locus of inhibition and suggests that inhibition operates at effector-specific motor stages. In Experiment 2, primes conveyed only response side information but left response modality uncertain, and negative compatibility effects were elicited for both hand and foot responses, suggesting that partially informative masked primes can trigger a parallel activation and subsequent inhibition of response processes within separate effector systems.     

Human reasoning: Some possible effects of availability

This paper discusses some possible ways in which the availability heuristic (Tversky and Kahneman, 1973) may mediate subjects' responses to experimental ‘reasoning’ tasks. A brief review of some effects of availability in other areas is given and then the application of availability to reasoning data is considered with respect to problems employing both ‘thematic’ and ‘abstract’ content.In the case of thematic content, it is argued, with reference to a variety of studies, that to produce a differential effect (to abstract content), the content must provide available cues, resulting from the subjects' experience. Differential effects of content are thus interpreted as differential effects of availability. When abstract content is used, there are cues available from the experimental situation itself, and it is shown that several known error tendencies readily lend themselves to an explanation in terms of availability.In the final section, it is pointed out that a focus on available cues, rather than logical structure, provides a psychological, rather than logical, approach to human reasoning. It is argued that a bias may be psychologically, although not logically, optimal in that it may often produce correct responses in ‘real life’. Accordingly, the possible real life utility of availability is considered, and several ways in which the bias may lead to usually correct decisions are discussed. Given this, it is argued that availability is an effective heuristic and that observed biases on a range of experimental tasks may thus be interpreted as resulting from the application of a behavior that is optimal within the limits of human cognition. However, it is concluded that limitations in both deterministic and probabilistic problem solving may lead to a consistent, but erroneous, view of the world.     

Concreteness and word production

Two experiments are reported that investigated the effect of concreteness on the ability to generate words to fit sentence contexts. When participants attempted to retrieve words from dictionary definitions in Experiment 1, abstract words were associated with more omissions and more alternates than were concrete words. These findings are consistent with the view that the semantic–lexical weights in the word production system are weaker for abstract than for concrete words. We found no evidence that greater competition from semantic neighbors was an additional reason why abstract words were harder to produce. Participants also reported more positive tip-of-the-tongue states (TOTs) when attempting to produce abstract words from their definitions, consistent with more phonological retrieval problems for abstract than for concrete words. In Experiment 2, participants attempted to generate words to fit into a sentence that described a specific event. The difference between the numbers of abstract and concrete words recalled was significantly smaller in the event condition than in the definition condition, and evidence no longer emerged of greater phonological retrieval failure for abstract words. Overall, the results are consistent with the view that the semantic–lexical weights, but not the lexical–phonological weights, are weaker for abstract than for concrete words in the word production system.     

The Impact of Necessity and Sufficiency in The Wason Four-Card Selection Task

Performance in the Wason card selection task is often improved given thematic content. Such content effects have been considered evidence against human rationality. We propose that the role of content lies in specifying premises underlying "if P, then Q" rules. Unlike thematic rules, abstract conditional rules do not explicitly provide material interpretation (P is a sufficient but not necessarily a necessary condition for Q), resulting in nonnormative responses. When necessity–sufficiency relations were explicated, normative responses were elicited and effects of other logically irrelevant components disappeared. The results suggest that content effects are compatible with human rationality.