Three experiments are reported that investigate the weighting attached to logic and belief in syllogistic reasoning. Substantial belief biases were observed despite controls for possible conversions of the premises. Equally substantial effects of logic were observed despite controls for two possible response biases. A consistent interaction between belief and logic was also recorded; belief bias was more marked on invalid than on valid syllogisms. In all experiments, verbal protocols were recorded and analyzed. These protocols are interpreted in some cases as providing rationalizations for prejudiced decisions and, in other cases, as reflecting a genuine process of premise to conclusion reasoning. In the latter cases, belief bias was minimal but still present. Similarly, even subjects who focus primarily on the conclusion are influenced to an extent by the logic. Thus a conflict between logic and belief is observed throughout, but at several levels of extent.An important debate in cognitive psychology surrounds the notion of rationality with respect to human inference (see Cohen, 1981, and associated commentaries). Recent reviews by Evans (1982) and Nisbett and Ross (1980) have stressed the role of apparently irrational processes in the study of inductive and deductive inference, respectively (see also Pollard, 1982). However, theories favoring a rationalist interpretation of inferential behavior still hold a dominant position in the recent literature (see, for example, the collections of papers edited by Falmagne, 1975, andMayer, 1978).In the case of deductive reasoning, much of the argument centers on the use by subjects of a system of logic, whether of the philosopher's variety (cf. Henle, 1962) or of an alternative "natural" type (e.g., Braine, 1978).The nonlogical or antirational position is sometimes misinterpreted as denigrating man's proven intelligence. What is in fact suggested is an alternative conception of that intelligence. The "rationalist" position entails the supposition that the reasoner proceeds by forming an abstract representation of problem information and applying a general set of inferential rules to its logical structure, regardless of its content. This notion is clearly embodied, for example, in Piaget's theory of formal operations (cf. Inhelder & Piaget, 1958). The alternative argument stressed here is that specific features of problem content, and their semantic associations, constitute the dominant influence on thought (see Evans, 1982, for extended discussion).
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