A little logic goes a long way: basing experiment on semantic theory in the cognitive science of conditional reasoning

Abstract

Modern logic provides accounts of both interpretation and derivation which work together to provide abstract frameworks for modelling the sensitivity of human reasoning to task, context and content. Cognitive theories have underplayed the importance of interpretative processes. We illustrate, using Wason's [Q. J. Exp. Psychol. 20 (1968) 273] selection task, how better empirical cognitive investigations and theories can be built directly on logical accounts when this imbalance is redressed.Subjects quite reasonably experience great difficulty in assigning logical form to descriptively interpreted rules in this task and materials, though not to deontically interpreted ones. The main empirical contrasts in reasoning performance are precisely between these interpretations, so better semantic theory can explain the main empirical effects. However, a more adequate notion of logical form than that typically employed in the psychology of reasoning is required, and we offer a richer alternative.Prima facie evidence that subjects do in fact experience the predicted difficulties in interpreting descriptive materials is provided by analyses of socratic tutoring dialogues. Experimental verification that these difficulties do in fact affect subjects' performance in the standard task is provided by six novel experimental conditions each designed to test different aspects of the semantic predictions.The results bear out the predictions. The semantic distinction between descriptive and deontic rules interacts with the task specifics to provide powerful generalisations about reasoning which surface in detailed explanations of many disparate observations. We conclude that semantic analyses have more direct benefits for psychological investigation than is usually credited, and conversely, that the * Corresponding author.E-mail address: k.stenning@ed.ac.uk (K. Stenning).

Semantic Interpretation as Computation in Nonmonotonic Logic: The Real Meaning of the Suppression Task

“…The present paper shows that a much more explicit approach to interpretation is possible once one accepts the lessons from the authors discussed above (and from linguistic discussions about the meaning of conditionals; see for example (Stenning and van Lambalgen, 2001, Stenning and van Lambalgen, 2004, Traugott et al, 1982, Athanasiadou and Dirven, 1997, that subjects generally allow rules to have exceptions. It will be seen that there is in fact an intimate connection between exception-handling and interpretation of discourse.…”

“…Elsewhere we have argued that Wason's selection task can be understood as largely invoking interpretative processes in subjects van Lambalgen, 2001, Stenning andvan Lambalgen, 2004, Stenning andCox, in press) have shown that syllogistic reasoning has, for the typical undergraduate subject, significant interpretative components, and that these interpretative processes play an important role in determining subsequent reasoning. Here we extend this approach to Byrne's suppression task (Byrne, 1989)-a more obviously interpretative task than either the selection task or syllogisms.…”

“…The inter-relations between systems are well understood from a century's worth of study. Psychologists' failure to exploit this knowledge, the existing systems, and the available techniques for creating new competence models, has led them, with few exceptions, to fail to make basic psychological distinctions (e.g., between defeasible interpretation and monotonic derivation here) and to fail to make simple predictions from the logical distinctions they have made (e.g., that deontic and descriptive conditionals pose quite different problems in the selection task (Stenning and van Lambalgen, 2004). Indeed a substantial proportion of psychological effort has gone into showing that logic cannot provide insight into the basis of human reasoning, with disastrous consequences for the psychology of reasoning.…”

Reasoning with conditionals in artificial intelligence

“…Indeed, Simon (1999) includes Prolog, along with ACT-R, "among the production systems widely used in cognitive simulation". Stenning and van Lambalgen (2004, 2005, 2008) also observe that forward chaining with production rules of the form:…”

“…In addition to the use of logic programming as a normative model of problem solving (Kowalski, 1974/79), Stenning and van Lambalgen (2004, 2005, 2008 are a clause, a Horn clause and a fact respectively. Notice that the second sentence can be regarded as an imprecise version of the first sentence.…”