The role of training, alternative models, and logical necessity in determining confidence in syllogistic reasoning

Turner, Jamie A. Prowse; Thompson, Valerie A.

doi:10.1080/13546780802619248

Cited by 37 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…The apparent disconnect between the accuracy and confidence findings as a function of problem type is consistent with previous findings in the metacognitive literature suggesting that the correlation between confidence and accuracy is very moderate and affected by several alternative variables, such as a feeling of rightness and processing fluency (Prowse Turner & Thompson, 2009; Shynkaruk & Thompson, 2006). …”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

When fast logic meets slow belief: Evidence for a parallel-processing model of belief bias

2016

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Two experiments pitted the default-interventionist account of belief bias against a parallel-processing model. According to the former, belief bias occurs because a fast, belief-based evaluation of the conclusion pre-empts a working-memory demanding logical analysis. In contrast, according to the latter both belief-based and logic-based responding occur in parallel. Participants were given deductive reasoning problems of variable complexity and instructed to decide whether the conclusion was valid on half the trials or to decide whether the conclusion was believable on the other half. When belief and logic conflict, the default-interventionist view predicts that it should take less time to respond on the basis of belief than logic, and that the believability of a conclusion should interfere with judgments of validity, but not the reverse. The parallel-processing view predicts that beliefs should interfere with logic judgments only if the processing required to evaluate the logical structure exceeds that required to evaluate the knowledge necessary to make a belief-based judgment, and vice versa otherwise. Consistent with this latter view, for the simplest reasoning problems (modus ponens), judgments of belief resulted in lower accuracy than judgments of validity, and believability interfered more with judgments of validity than the converse. For problems of moderate complexity (modus tollens and single-model syllogisms), the interference was symmetrical, in that validity interfered with belief judgments to the same degree that believability interfered with validity judgments. For the most complex (three-term multiple-model syllogisms), conclusion believability interfered more with judgments of validity than vice versa, in spite of the significant interference from conclusion validity on judgments of belief.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.3758/s13421-016-0680-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 89%

When fast logic meets slow belief: Evidence for a parallel-processing model of belief bias

2016

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“…Contrary to this research, however, Prowse Turner and Thompson (2009) did not observe an accuracy difference between the two types, but did find that singlemodel syllogisms were given higher on confidence judgments than their multiplemodel counterparts. Therefore, they provided evidence that confidence judgement can be dissociated from accuracy.…”

Section: Models In Syllogistic Reasoningcontrasting

confidence: 98%

“…Similarly, FOR is also cue-based and inferential (Bajšanski, Močibob, & Valerjev, 2014;Bajšanski, Zauhar, & Valerjev, 2018;Prowse Turner & Thompson, 2009;Quayle & Ball, 2000;Shynkaruk & Thompson, 2006;Thompson et al, 2011). These studies have shown that reasoners' confidence judgements and accuracy are not well aligned in many reasoning domains, as indicated by the low correlations between the two variables.…”

Section: Predictors Of Formentioning

confidence: 99%

Fluency and Feeling of Rightness

Wang

Thompson

2019

Psihol. teme (Online)

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Feeling of Rightness (FOR) is a metacognitive experience accompanying people's intuitive answers that predicts the probability of subsequently changing answers (Thompson, Prowse Turner, & Pennycook, 2011). Previous research suggested FOR judgments are influenced by cues such as fluency, i.e., the ease with which an answer comes to mind. In the current paper, we examine the relationship between FOR, fluency, and answer changes; in particular, we were interested in whether answer fluency drives the effect of FOR on subsequent behaviours pertaining to answer changes. Reasoners (N = 64) in each of four experiments were asked to determine the validity of 32 syllogisms that consisted of single-model and multiple-model problems. In addition, each problem was randomly paired with a question containing either a high anchor value (80% or 90%) or a low anchor value (10% or 20%). In the first two experiments, reasoners then provided a FOR rating on a scale from 0 to 100 and indicated whether they would like to attempt to re-answer the question. The last two experiments served as the control experiments in which the FOR judgements were removed. The anchoring manipulation affected FOR judgments but not re-answer choices; it also did not affect answer fluency. Thus influencing FOR without affecting answer fluency had no effect on people's subsequent re-answer choices. In contrast, fluency was a reliable predictor of both FOR and re-answer choices. That is, when answers came to mind slowly, FORs were lower and people were more likely to choose to re-answer the problems. Thus, fluency appears to mediate the relationship between FOR and re-answer choices.

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“…Finally, our work suggests new tools for assessing the calibration of confidence and accuracy in deductive reasoning (ProwseTurner & Thompson, 2009;Shynkaruk & Thompson, 2006). For instance, Prowse-Turner and Thompson (2009) showed that while reasoners tend to be poorly calibrated (overconfident) for the syllogistic reasoning task, calibration can be much improved with training that involves trial-by-trial accuracy feedback and instruction in the concept of logical necessity.…”

Section: Broader Implications For Reasoning and Related Areas Of Cognmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For instance, Prowse-Turner and Thompson (2009) showed that while reasoners tend to be poorly calibrated (overconfident) for the syllogistic reasoning task, calibration can be much improved with training that involves trial-by-trial accuracy feedback and instruction in the concept of logical necessity. Although the analytical approach taken by the authors was quite rigorous, accuracy was assessed in some cases by using percent correct.…”

Section: Broader Implications For Reasoning and Related Areas Of Cognmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing the belief bias effect with ROCs: It's a response bias effect.

Dubé¹,

Rotello²,

Heit³

2010

Psychological Review

108

215

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A belief bias effect in syllogistic reasoning (Evans, Barston, & Pollard, 1983) is observed when subjects accept more valid than invalid arguments and more believable than unbelievable conclusions and show greater overall accuracy in judging arguments with unbelievable conclusions. The effect is measured with a contrast of contrasts, comparing the acceptance rates for valid and invalid arguments with believable and unbelievable conclusions. We show that use of this measure entails the assumption of a threshold model, which predicts linear receiver operating characteristics (ROCs). In 3 experiments, subjects made "valid"/"invalid" responses to syllogisms, followed by confidence ratings that allowed the construction of empirical ROCs; ROCs were also constructed from a base-rate manipulation in one experiment. In all cases, the form of the empirical ROCs was curved and therefore inconsistent with the assumptions of Klauer, Musch, and Naumer's (2000) multinomial model of belief bias. We propose a more appropriate, signal detection-based model of belief bias. We then use that model to develop theoretically sound and empirically justified measures of decision accuracy and response bias; those measures demonstrate that the belief bias effect is simply a response bias effect. Thus, our data and analyses challenge existing theories of belief bias because those theories predict an accuracy effect that our data suggest is a Type I error. Our results also provide support for processing theories of deduction that assume responses are driven by a graded argument-strength variable, such as the probability heuristic model proposed by Chater and Oaksford (1999).

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The role of training, alternative models, and logical necessity in determining confidence in syllogistic reasoning

Cited by 37 publications

References 37 publications

When fast logic meets slow belief: Evidence for a parallel-processing model of belief bias

When fast logic meets slow belief: Evidence for a parallel-processing model of belief bias

Fluency and Feeling of Rightness

Assessing the belief bias effect with ROCs: It's a response bias effect.

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