An Alternative to Piaget's Conceptualization of Logical Competence

Ennis, Robert H.

doi:10.2307/1128426

Cited by 64 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…Importantly, among several kinds of evidence for his theory, the first evidence advocated by Braine (1990) was the primitiveness of the hypothesized inferential forms and the fact that they are available early in children. He noted that children make inferences of the Modus Ponens form as early as it seems practicable to test them, at least by five years of age (Ennis, 1976;Hawkins, Pea, Glick, & Scribner, 1984), and he added ''intuitively, if one is unable to make inferences of this form, one does not understand the meaning of If'' (Braine, 1990, p. 149). Those reasoning forms that appeared more difficult and of later advent in development were excluded from the primary skills and the basic meaning of the connective.…”

Section: A Late Developmental Achievementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Probability in reasoning: A developmental test on conditionals

Barrouillet

Gauffroy

2015

Cognition

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a b s t r a c tProbabilistic theories have been claimed to constitute a new paradigm for the psychology of reasoning. A key assumption of these theories is captured by what they call the Equation, the hypothesis that the meaning of the conditional is probabilistic in nature and that the probability of If p then q is the conditional probability, in such a way that P(if p then q) = P(q|p). Using the probabilistic truth-table task in which participants are required to evaluate the probability of If p then q sentences, the present study explored the pervasiveness of the Equation through ages (from early adolescence to adulthood), types of conditionals (basic, causal, and inducements) and contents. The results reveal that the Equation is a late developmental achievement only endorsed by a narrow majority of educated adults for certain types of conditionals depending on the content they involve. Agerelated changes in evaluating the probability of all the conditionals studied closely mirror the development of truth-value judgements observed in previous studies with traditional truth-table tasks. We argue that our modified mental model theory can account for this development, and hence for the findings related with the probability task, which do not consequently support the probabilistic approach of human reasoning over alternative theories.

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Section: A Late Developmental Achievementmentioning

confidence: 99%

Probability in reasoning: A developmental test on conditionals

Barrouillet

Gauffroy

2015

Cognition

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“…Both Klaczynski's and Verschueren's dual-process theories agree that producing indeterminate inferences on the AC and DA forms rely on analytic processes. Actually, there is abundant evidence that the production of these indeterminate inferences increases with age from childhood to adulthood, strongly suggesting that, more often than children, adults rely on analytic processes when reasoning from conditional statements (Barrouillet et al, 2000;Barrouillet et al, 2001;De Neys & Everaerts, 2008;Ennis, 1976;Jenveau-Brennan & Markovits, 1999;Markovits, Fleury, Quinn, & Venet, 1998;O'Brien & Overton, 1982).…”

Section: Relationships With Other Dual-process Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Heuristic and analytic processes in mental models for conditionals: An integrative developmental theory

Gauffroy

Barrouillet

2009

Developmental Review

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a b s t r a c tThis article presents a developmental dual-process theory of the understanding of conditionals that integrates Evans' heuristic-analytic theory within the revised mental model theory of conditional proposed by Barrouillet, Gauffroy, and Lecas (2008). According to this theory, the interpretation of a conditional sentence is driven by unconscious and implicit heuristic processes that provide individuals with an initial representation that captures its meaning by representing the cases that make it true. This initial model can be enriched with additional models (a process named fleshing out within the mental model theory) through the intervention of conscious and demanding analytic processes. Being optional, these processes construct representations of cases that are only compatible with the conditional, leaving its truth-value indeterminate when they occur. Because heuristic processes are relatively immune to developmental changes, while analytic processes strongly develop with age, the initial model remains stable through development whereas the number of additional models that can be constructed increases steadily. Thus, the dual-process mental model theory predicts in which cases conditionals will be deemed true, indeterminate, or false and how these cases evolve with age. These predictions were verified in children, adolescents and adults who were asked to evaluate the truth value and the probability of several types of conditionals. The results reveal a variety of developmental trajectories in the way different conditionals are interpreted, which can all be accounted for by our revised mental model theory.

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“…Modus ponens is the simplest of the deductive inferences that can be made in conditional logic. Developmental studies have shown that very young children can reliably make the MP inference (Ennis, 1976) before any of the other conditional inferences, such as modus tollens (MT), and so on. Adults generally tend to endorse the MP inference at a very high rate (Evans, 1993).…”

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confidence: 99%

Suppression of valid inferences and knowledge structures: The curious effect of producing alternative antecedents on reasoning with causal conditionals

Markovits

Potvin

2001

Memory & Cognition

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The ability to make logical inferences is one of the key components of human reasoning. There has been a great deal of empirical and theoretical attention given to models of how humans make deductions. However, there is one very basic aspect of logical reasoning that has curiously received relatively little attention. One of the critical aspects of logical reasoning is the explicit requirement to disregard the empirical truth of the premises used to make inferences, a requirement that is often expressed by the instructions to "suppose that the premises are true." Yet, although we know that following such instructions is not always easy for even educated reasoners, there is no clear model of just what is involved in doing so, and why this might be difficult. This paper attempts to suggest such a model and to examine it by looking at a paradoxical phenomenon concerning reasoning with causal conditionals.Studies of deductive reasoning in both adults and children have clearly shown that people often make deductions that are not consistent with the rules of formal logic. In the context of the focus of this paper, the most interesting of these cases concerns the logical rule known as modus ponens (MP). This requires a reasoner to suppose that a given "If P then Q" conditional relation is true, and then to deduce that "P is true" implies that "Q is true." Modus ponens is the simplest of the deductive inferences that can be made in conditional logic. Developmental studies have shown that very young children can reliably make the MP inference (Ennis, 1976) before any of the other conditional inferences, such as modus tollens (MT), and so on. Adults generally tend to endorse the MP inference at a very high rate (Evans, 1993). In fact, both of the major theories of human reasoning consider that making the MP inference requires a minimal amount of cognitive effort. Rules theorists (e.g., Braine & O'Brien, 1991;Rips, 1994) consider MP to be one of the most basic of the inference rules that they claim characterize how people make deductive inferences. Braine (1990) has even proposed that the MP inference rule should be considered a logical primitive with biological origins. Mental model theory considers that the MP inference requires the least costly of the possible representations of the conditional (the "iniPreparation of this manuscript was supported by grants from the Fonds pour la Formation de Chercheurs et l'Aide à la Recherche (FCAR) and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council (NSERC) to H.M. The authors thank David Over and Denise Cummins for their helpful comments on a previous version of this manuscript. Correspondence should be addressed to H. Markovits, Department of Psychology, University of Quebec, C.P. 8888, Succ. "A," Montreal, PQ, H3C 3P8 Canada (e-mail: markovits.henry@uqam.ca). Suppression of valid inferences and knowledgestructures: The curious effect of producing alternative antecedents on reasoning with causal conditionals HENRY MARKOVITS and FRÉDÉRIC POTVIN University of Quebec, Montreal, Quebec, C...

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An Alternative to Piaget's Conceptualization of Logical Competence

Cited by 64 publications

References 21 publications

Probability in reasoning: A developmental test on conditionals

Probability in reasoning: A developmental test on conditionals

Heuristic and analytic processes in mental models for conditionals: An integrative developmental theory

Suppression of valid inferences and knowledge structures: The curious effect of producing alternative antecedents on reasoning with causal conditionals

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