The Primacy of Superordinate-Level Category Questions in the Game of 20 Questions

Abstract

The initial questions of 180 males and females between the ages of 12 and 26 years were classified as they participated in a 20-questions problem-solving procedure. Three levels of questions (superordinate, basic, and subordinate) were observed for an array of conceptually organized exemplars. No age or gender differences were found but preference for superordinate-level initial questions was significant.

Verbal problem‐solving in autism spectrum disorders: A problem of plan construction?

“…While it may be best known as a fairly repetitive game played on long, boring car journeys, Twenty Questions and similar games have a long history as experimental tasks within psychological research. The Twenty Questions Task (TQT) and its analogues have been used to examine cognitive skills in typically-developing children and adults (Denney, 1972(Denney, , 1974Denney, Denney, & Ziobrowski, 1973;Drumm, Jackson, & Magley, 1995;Drumm & Jackson, 1996;Herwig, 1982;Laughlin, Moss, & Miller, 1969;Mosher & Hornsby, 1966;Siegler, 1977;Taylor & Faust, 1952;Thornton, 1982;Van Horn & Bartz, 1968), children and young people with learning disabilities (Barton, 1988;Borys, 1979;Copeland & Weissbrod, 1983;Simmonds, 1990;Tant & Douglas, 1982), adults with chronic alcoholism (Laine & Butters, 1982;Saarnio, 1993), and adults with various types of brain injury (Baldo, Delis, Wilkins, & Shimamura, 2004; F. C. Goldstein & Levin, 1991;Klouda & Cooper, 1990; Levin et al, 1993;Levin et al, 1997;Marshall, Harvey, Freed, & Phillips, 1996;Marshall et al, 2004;Marshall, Karow, Morelli, Iden, & Dixon, 2003a, 2003bMarshall, McGurk, Karow, & Kairy, 2007;Upton & Thompson, 1999;Vilkki, 1988).…”

“…From around the age of 11, children report strategies that resemble this approach (Drumm, et al, 1995;Drumm & Jackson, 1996). The choice of such a strategy appears to be mostly "online", that is, it occurs during the task itself, each question at a time.…”

“…First, the participant age range was relatively wide (9:3 -16:0) and covers a period in which problem-solving abilities may change considerably (Drumm & Jackson, 1996;Yurgelun-Todd, 2007). By age 11, most typically-developing children would be expected to use a variety of abstract categories to effectively interrogate a Twenty Questions set (Drumm, Jackson, & Magley, 1995;Mosher & Hornsby, 1966). The main effects of age observed in the present study point towards its influence on both the TQT and related planning processes.…”