Anderson Cognitive Psychology Ch. 10 — Reasoning

normative

what people should do (logical, mathematical)

descriptive

what people actually do

4 types of predicates

universal affirmative, universal negative, particular affirmative, particular negative

content effects

if the logically-justified conclusion is at odds w/ the real world, becomes harder

base rates

P(p) and P(q)

syllogisms

arguments consisting of 2 premises and a conclusion

syllogism example

all poodles are pets

all pets have names

therefore: all poodles have names

left ventral prefrontal & left temporal-parietal

reasoning about material w/ meaningful content

posterior parietal region

reasoning about problems w/o meaningful content

deductive reasoning

conclusions that follow w/ certainty from the premises (i.e., fred is the uncle of lisa)

inductive reasoning

conclusions that follow probabilistically from the premises (i.e., fred is older than lisa)

conditional statement

if, then

antecedent

if

consequent

then

Modus ponens

Given A is true, infer B is true -- valid

Modus tollens

Given B is false, infer A is false -- valid

Affirmation of the Consequent

Given B is true, infer A is true -- invalid

Denial of the Antecedent

Given A is false, infer B is false -- invalid

Bayesian inference

idea that estimation of the probability of an outcome is determined by prior probability and likelihood

Bayes nets

probabilistic graphical model

if-then statements

can be interpreted as logical conditionals or causal statements

Wason Selection Task

EK47. If a card has a vowel on one side, then it has an even number on the other side.

permission schema

performance on Wason task is better when the condition (if, then) statement is about a social norm

social contract rules

depend on our skill at detecting cheaters

logical quantifiers

Elements such as all, no, some, and some ... not that appear in statements like All A are B and Some C are not D.

universal statements

blanket statements with no exceptions. all or none.

categorical syllogism

statements containing qualifiers such as all, no, some...not. 2 premises and a conclusion.

atmosphere hypothesis

logical qualifiers in a syllogism create an atmosphere that predisposes participants to accept conclusions with the same qualifiers

particular statements

statements w/ some or some...not

mental model theory

ppl make a mental model of a world that satisfies the premises and inspects the model to see whether the conclusion is justified

conjunctive concept

2 stars. easiest.

disjunctive concept

2 borders or 2 diamonds

relational concept

# of objects = # of borders

attribute identification

determining which features are relevant

rule learning

determining what rule connects the features

confirmation bias

testing only instances that support hypothesis

ACC

when viewing inconsistent evidence, ppl have more activation in the _____

type 1 processes

rapid & automatic

type 2 processes

slow & deliberative

the backfire effect

ppl see contradictory evidence as an attack on their beliefs, so they strengthen their beliefs even more

selection bias

A polling error in which the sample is not representative of the population being studied, so that some opinions are over- or underrepresented

survivorship bias

an error that comes from focusing only on surviving examples, causing us to misjudge a situation (i.e., conductors).

Gambler's Fallacy

random looks more likely

availability heuristic

estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory; if instances come readily to mind (perhaps because of their vividness), we presume such events are common