No abstract

No abstract

According to Geary's evolutionary approach, humans are able to easily acquire primary knowledge and, with more efforts, secondary knowledge. The present study investigates how primary knowledge contents can facilitate the learning of formal logical rules i.e. secondary knowledge. Framing formal logical problems in evolutionary salient contexts should increase learners' efficiency, motivation and engagement in learning compared with framing logical problems in secondary knowledge. In two experiments, high school students (n=210) had to train with syllogisms of unknown content (to reduce the use of prior knowledge) and which could be related to primary knowledge (rules about invented food and animals) or secondary knowledge (fictitious mathematics and grammar rules) in order to best pass a final test. The training phase was compulsory or left to learners' choice. In a third experiment, participants (university students, n=227) were confronted with three phases: (i) a priming phase consisting of problems with primary or secondary knowledge contents, then (ii) a training phase consisting of secondary knowledge only and (iii) the final test. Results confirmed the positive influence of primary knowledge in a learning task: participants were more efficient, more motivated, more confident and experienced less cognitive load when confronted with primary knowledge compared to secondary knowledge. In particular, primary knowledge favored the involvement and persistence of learners in the training phase regardless of their personal characteristics unlike secondary knowledge. Finally, presenting primary knowledge first and then secondary knowledge was more efficient both in terms of performance and motivation. The evolutionary approach to knowledge would provide a framework for developing a way to present new content that is cost-efficient in keeping learners motivated, whatever their age or personal characteristics.

No abstract

In terms of sexual intercourse, the very last people we think about are our kin. Imagining inbreeding intercourse, whether it involves our closest kin or not, induces aversion in most people who invoke inbreeding depression problems or cultural considerations. Research has focused on the disgust felt when facing inbreeding intercourse between close kin but little is known about other responses. In this study, we considered the influence of fitness costs on aversive reactions by including disgust and emotional reaction as well as moral judgment and attitudes toward inbreeding: higher costs should induce a stronger aversive reaction. The fitness costs were manipulated by two factors: (i) the degree of the participants' involvement in the story (themselves, a sib or an unknown individual), and (ii) the degree of relatedness between the two inbreeding people (brother/sister, uncle-aunt/niece-nephew, cousin). To test this hypothesis, 140 women read and assessed different inbreeding stories varying in the fitness costs incurred. Findings showed that the higher the fitness costs were, the greater the aversive reaction was in an overall way. First, our results fitted with previous studies that tested the influence of fitness costs on disgust. Second, and more interestingly, findings went further by examining overall aversion, showing that fitness costs could influence emotions felt as well as attitudes and behaviors toward inbreeding people. The higher the fitness costs were, the less inbreeding people were perceived as moral and the more they were considered as a nuisance. However, results regarding avoidance were more nuanced.