Abstract reasoning and the interpretation of basic conditionals

Autor: Janie Brisson, Pier-Luc de Chantal, Henry Markovits
Rok vydání: 2018
Předmět:
Zdroj: Thinking & Reasoning. 25:1-13
ISSN: 1464-0708
1354-6783
DOI: 10.1080/13546783.2018.1452795
Popis: Studies examining the interpretation that is given to if–then statementstypically use what are referred to as basic conditionals, which give contextless relations between two unrelated concrete terms (If the ball is blue, then the shape is square). However, there is some evidence that basic conditionals require a more abstract form of representation. In order to examine this, we presented participants with truth-table tasks involving either basic conditionals or conditionals referring to imaginary categories (If it is a bori, then it has red wings), and standard conditional inference tasks with abstract and familiar premises. As expected, fewer typical defective conditional interpretations were given to basic conditionals. In addition, partial correlations showed a unique relationship between the interpretation of basic conditionals and abstract inferential reasoning. Results suggest that people process basic conditionals as a form of abstract reasoning, and that the interpretation of conditionals...
Databáze: OpenAIRE