Conditional reasoning and conditionalization.

In solving conditional reasoning problems, reasoners are assumed to compute the probability of the conclusion, conditionalizing first on the categorical premise, giving the knowledge-based component, and conditionalizing then on the conditional-statement premise, from which the assumption-based component is derived. Because reasoners find it difficult to compute the second-step conditionalization except when the conditional-statement premise is found to be related to the result of the first-step conditionalization as for modus ponens or, possibly, for modus tollens, the knowledge-based component generally dominates reasoning performance. After representing all the possible cases in which conditional-argument forms may appear, this approach was found to be consistent with the results from the 3 experiments reported in this study, whereas 2 alternative hypotheses account for only some of the results. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conditional reasoning: The necessary and sufficient conditions.

Five experiments, with 163 university students, investigated 2 theories of conditional reasoning (CDR). The pragmatic schema theory posits that CDR is mediated by context-sensitive inference rules. According to the contextual cuing theory, inferences are based on a mental model that represents necessity and sufficiency relations. Both schematic relations and necessity relations predicted responses on a 4-card selection task. In contrast, after the effects of perceived necessity had been partialled out, schematic relations did not predict responses to either a conditional arguments task or a task in which Ss judged the similarity of "if then" and "only if" statements. Findings question the assumption that reasoning is mediated by schematic rules, which presumably apply regardless of task. A reconceptualization of the pragmatic reasoning schema is proposed. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conditional reasoning with inducements and advice

In an earlier study of conditional reasoning, Newstead et al. [Newstead, S.E., Ellis, C.E., Evans, J.St.B.T., Dennis, I., (1997). Conditional reasoning with realistic material. Thinking and Reasoning 3, 49-96] found that people drew more inferences from conditionals framed as inducements (threats and promises) than from conditionals phrased as advice (tips and warnings). The present study was designed to test the hypothesis that this difference arose from the fact that the speaker of an inducement is normally seen to have control over the consequent event whereas the giver of advice does not. In the experiment reported here, inducement and advice conditionals were constructed in brief contexts such that in either case the speaker could be seen to have high or low control. Participants drew many more conditional inferences of all kinds for high control than for low control conditionals in either context. A second finding of interest was that participants drew many more forward (antecedent to consequent) inferences than backward inferences with these kinds of realistic conditionals.     

Analogical reasoning in young children.

Assessed the performance of 4- and 5-year-olds on geometric analogy tasks. Each task consisted of 16 analogy problems that were presented in a manipulative, gamelike context and that used attribute blocks that varied on the dimensions of color, size, and shape. Experiment 1 demonstrated that many of the preschoolers were capable of applying analogical reasoning in the solution of geometric analogy problems of the form A:B::C:?. We also found that children who did not consistently reason analogically showed evidence of a reasoning strategy that was governed by a hierarchical rule structure. Experiment 2, in which a modified version of the geometric analogy task in Experiment 1 was used, confirmed the findings of the initial experiment with regard to the analogical reasoning ability of 4- and 5-year-olds. The rule structure was verified for nonanalogical reasoners, whereas analogical reasoners generally exhibited no consistent pattern in their response errors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conditional reasoning, representation, and level of abstraction.

This study examined the idea that (1) reasoning involves construction of mental representations (models) of premises and that (2) there is a developmental progression in the ability of Ss to reason with models containing concrete and abstract elements. Exp 1 found that for 13- and 16-yr-old Ss, reasoning with abstract content was more difficult than with concrete content. Younger Ss appeared to rely more on concrete representations that used real-world knowledge than on more general abstract representations. Exp 2 explored order effects in the presentation of concrete and abstract problems. Abstract followed by concrete problems led to reduced concrete-problem performance for high school students but did not affect performance for university students. These results support the hypotheses and suggest that development of formal reasoning abilities goes through 2 levels. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Conditional reasoning in autism: Activation and integration of knowledge and belief.

Everyday conditional reasoning is typically influenced by prior knowledge and belief in the form of specific exceptions known as counterexamples. This study explored whether adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD; N = 26) were less influenced by background knowledge than typically developing adolescents (N = 38) when engaged in conditional reasoning. Participants were presented with pretested valid and invalid conditional inferences with varying available counterexamples. The group with ASD showed significantly less influence of prior knowledge on valid inferences (p = .01) and invalid inferences (p = .01) compared with the typical group. In a secondary probability judgment task, no significant group differences were found in probabilistic judgments of the believability of the premises. Further experiments found that results could not be explained by differences between the groups in the ability to generate counterexamples or any tendency among adolescents with ASD to exhibit a “yes” response pattern. It was concluded that adolescents with ASD tend not to spontaneously contextualize presented material when engaged in everyday reasoning. These findings are discussed with reference to weak central coherence theory and the conditional reasoning literature. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of elementary deductive reasoning in young children.

This study examined the claim (J. Hawkins et al; see record 1984-25517-001) that young children can reason deductively with content for which "practical knowledge is irrelevant." Ss 6, 8, and 11 years of age were given a set of standard logical syllogisms and a matching set of illogical ones. Six-year-olds gave similar responses to and used similar types of justifications for both logical and illogical forms, indicating that correct performance on the former might be accounted for by a low-level matching strategy, not necessarily by deductive reasoning. A clear developmental pattern emerged, showing that the ability of children to differentiate responses to the two forms improves over this age period. However, the number of children able to explicitly describe illogicality remained small, even among 11-year-olds. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Collaboration promotes proportional reasoning about resource distribution in young children.

The authors investigated how children and adults evaluate the “niceness” of individuals who engage in resource distribution, with a focus on their sensitivity to the proportion of resources given. Across 3 experiments, subjects evaluated the niceness of a child who gave a quantity of pennies to another child. In Study 1 (N = 30), adults showed sensitivity to the proportion given, whereas 5- and 7-year-old children did not. In Study 2 (N = 74), both younger (3- to 5-year-old) and older (6- to 8-year-old) children were sensitive to proportion only when resources were earned by a giver in collaboration with the recipient rather than by the giver alone. Adults, however, were sensitive to proportion in both cases. In Study 3 (N = 44), the authors tested 5- and 6-year-olds and their parents to be sure that socioeconomic and ethnic differences between samples did not drive results and replicated key findings from Studies 1 and 2. Together, these findings indicate that children favor proportional resource distribution in situations that invoke intuitions about equity. The authors suggest that these intuitions may form the basis for adult notions of fairness and generosity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Developmental analysis of the conditional reasoning abilities of primary-grade children.

Administered a conditional reasoning test to 36 1st-3rd graders. Each child was tested individually with a concrete and a verbal presentation of the test items. After his response to each test item, the child was asked to explain the reason for his response. An analysis of variance of the number of correct judgments showed significant main effects for Grade Level, Mode of Presentation, and Principle, and a significant Grade Level * Principle interaction. An examination of the explanations for correct judgments revealed that children's problem-solving behaviors varied according to both testing session and principle of inference. (20 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of proportional reasoning: Where young children go wrong.

Previous studies have found that children have difficulty solving proportional reasoning problems involving discrete units until 10 to 12 years of age, but can solve parallel problems involving continuous quantities by 6 years of age. The present studies examine where children go wrong in processing proportions that involve discrete quantities. A computerized proportional equivalence choice task was administered to kindergartners through 4th-graders in Study 1, and to 1st- and 3rd-graders in Study 2. Both studies involved 4 between-subjects conditions that were formed by pairing continuous and discrete target proportions with continuous and discrete choice alternatives. In Study 1, target and choice alternatives were presented simultaneously; in Study 2, target and choice alternatives were presented sequentially. In both studies, children performed significantly worse when both the target and choice alternatives were represented with discrete quantities than when either or both of the proportions involved continuous quantities. Taken together, these findings indicate that children go astray on proportional reasoning problems involving discrete units only when a numerical match is possible, suggesting that their difficulty is due to an overextension of numerical equivalence concepts to proportional equivalence problems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prosocial reasoning among children and adults in a Papua New Guinea society.

N. Eisenberg's (1982) prosocial moral reasoning interview, adapted to the setting, was administered to members of the small-scale, traditional, collectivistically oriented Maisin society of New Guinea. The sample consisted of 69 elementary school children (mean age range 8–13 yrs), 8 adolescents (aged 14–20 yrs), and 24 adults (aged 24–60 yrs). Results indicate that no new reasoning categories were used by the Ss. Children and adults used physical-needs-oriented reasoning most frequently. Adults used significantly more psychological-needs-oriented reasoning than did younger Ss. It is suggested that Maisin prosocial reasoning develops toward empathic concern for others but not toward concern with one's own internal states as motivators of behavior or toward generalized notions of society. Developmental patterns suggest that initial exposure to Western schooling is associated with an increase in hedonistic reasoning and a decrease in needs-oriented reasoning, although this trend appears to reverse after Grade 3. The internal organization of Maisin prosocial reasoning as well as the specific reasoning categories used by the Maisin are congruent with the nature of their society. Results of the study support the idea that moral reasoning patterns develop as adaptive responses to actual circumstances of social living. (28 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Respecting children: Moral reasoning when right conduct joins punishing outcomes.

To help evaluate J. Piaget's and L. Kohlberg's differing theories about the motivational sources of moral realism, 48 5-yr-olds were orally presented stories in which obedient conduct was followed by punishment and disobedient conduct was followed by reward. Stories varied according to whether the character's conduct was given first, followed by the outcome, or vice versa, and according to whether the agent of outcome was a respected adult or chance. Ss' use of the character's conduct, rather than the outcomes, as their basis for moral judgments was measured. Both story order and agent of outcome affected the choice of dimension used. Earlier data reported by Kohlberg and others, in which response outcomes determined many moral judgments, would seem to be artifacts of the story design. Children in this study regularly showed attention to adults and to their rules, as Piaget's theory postulates. (French summary) (8 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Proportional reasoning in young children: The parts and the whole of it.

Evidence concerning intuitive foundations for fraction learning was obtained in a study of early developments in proportional reasoning. Children aged 5 to 7 years (kindergarten to 2nd grade) were given problems constructed so as to differentiate between reasoning based on the relations of a part to the whole versus reasoning based on relations between one part and another. The participants were able to use part-whole relations to compare proportions by 7 years of age. In addition, a developmental shift toward increasing reliance on part-whole reasoning was observed in children's responses to conflict problems that pitted part-whole and part-part matches against each other. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Unities in inductive reasoning.

Three experiments determined the sources of communalities in performance on 3 inductive reasoning tasks: analogies, series completions, and classifications. In Exp I, 30 undergraduates completed an untimed pencil-and-paper test in which they were asked to solve 90 induction items with names of mammals as content. Items were equally divided among the 3 kinds of induction tasks. Ss' task was to rank order 4 response options in terms of their goodness of fit as completions for each particular item. Data sets for the 3 tasks were highly intercorrelated, and a single exponential model of response choice provided a good fit to each data set. In Exp II, 36 Ss completed a timed test in which they were asked to solve 90 mammal-name induction items. Items were again equally divided among the 3 kinds of tasks. Ss' task was to choose the better of 2 response options as a completion for each particular item. Data sets for the tasks were again highly intercorrelated, and a single linear model of response times provided a good fit to each data set. In Exp III, 18 Ss were timed while solving 1,440 induction items with schematic picture, verbal, and geometric content. Items were approximately equally divided among the 3 kinds of tasks. Both analysis of stimulus and of S variance supported the notion of highly related performance algorithms on the 3 tasks. It is concluded that a common or highly similar model of response choice and of information processing can account for at least some of the previously observed relationships in performance across induction tasks. (59 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Relations between inductive reasoning and deductive reasoning.

One of the most important open questions in reasoning research is how inductive reasoning and deductive reasoning are related. In an effort to address this question, we applied methods and concepts from memory research. We used 2 experiments to examine the effects of logical validity and premise–conclusion similarity on evaluation of arguments. Experiment 1 showed 2 dissociations: For a common set of arguments, deduction judgments were more affected by validity, and induction judgments were more affected by similarity. Moreover, Experiment 2 showed that fast deduction judgments were like induction judgments—in terms of being more influenced by similarity and less influenced by validity, compared with slow deduction judgments. These novel results pose challenges for a 1-process account of reasoning and are interpreted in terms of a 2-process account of reasoning, which was implemented as a multidimensional signal detection model and applied to receiver operating characteristic data. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Deductive reasoning in schizophrenia.

The Von Domarus principle, as formulated by Von Domarus and Arieti, was subjected to critical and empirical review. Previous studies on the Von Domarus principle were judged inadequate on the bases of unwarranted interpretation and restricted scope. 50 hospitalized normal patients and 50 schizophrenic patients were administered a 96-item syllogistic test and verbal IQ test. The 1st 3 figures of the traditional syllogism were used and 4 content categories: abstract, concrete, personal, and nonpersonal. No significant differences were found between the 2 groups on the experimental items. Contrary to expectation, the figure (II) describing the Von Domarus principle was the easiest of the 3 figures. The author suggests that a different conceptual approach be used in examining schizophrenic thinking. (30 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Goal-oriented critical reasoning and individual differences in critical reasoning biases.

In 4 experiments, the relationship among critical reasoning, personal goals, general intellectual ability, and information-processing style were explored. Three critical reasoning competencies were investigated: the law of large numbers, the intuitive analysis of covariance, and the ability to detect flaws in experimental designs. Participants were presented problems that involved goal-enhancing, goal-neutral, and goal-threatening evidence. There were 2 main findings: (a) Although general ability predicted 2 components of critical reasoning, biases in reasoning were better predicted by information processing style (i.e., rational vs. intuitive). (b) Reasoning on the goal-enhancing and neutral problems was less sophisticated than reasoning on threatening problems. Depth of processing seems to be a primary mechanism underlying motivated reasoning. In addition, information processing style is an individual difference variable that moderates the extent of reasoning biases. Similar results were obtained across different forms of critical thinking. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive processes in propositional reasoning.

Propositional reasoning is the ability to draw conclusions on the basis of sentence connectives such as "and," "if," "or," and "not." A psychological theory of propositional reasoning explains the mental operations that underlie this ability. The ANDS (A Natural Deduction System) model, described in this article, is one such theory that makes explicit assumptions about memory and control in deduction. ANDS uses natural deduction rules that manipulate propositions in a hierarchically structured working memory and that apply in either a forward or a backward direction (from the premises of an argument to its conclusion or from the conclusion to the premises). The rules also allow suppositions to be introduced during the deduction process. A computer simulation incorporating these ideas yields proofs that are similar to those of untrained Ss, as assessed by their decisions and explanations concerning the validity of arguments. The model also provides an account of memory for proofs in text and can be extended to a theory of causal connectives. (65 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Familiarity effects in conditional reasoning.

Attempted to determine whether familiarity with content influences performance on conditional reasoning problems of the form "P implies Q" independently of ease of generation of specific examples of "Q and not-P." A paper-and-pencil test consisting of 4 problems in which these 2 factors were varied was administered to 488 undergraduates. For problems with easy access to instances of "Q and not-P" and for those with no such possibility, increased content familiarity resulted in higher performance levels. (5 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)