Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-669899f699-7xsfk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-26T01:03:42.562Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - Interpretation, Representation, and Deductive Reasoning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

By
Keith Stenning  and
Michiel Van Lambalgen
Edited by
Jonathan E. Adler  and
Lance J. Rips
Keith Stenning
Affiliation:
University of Edinburgh
Michiel Van Lambalgen
Affiliation:
University of Amsterdam
Jonathan E. Adler
Affiliation:
Brooklyn College, City University of New York
Lance J. Rips
Affiliation:
Northwestern University, Illinois
Get access

Summary

A View with no Room

Is the psychology of deduction about the few well-known laboratory tasks in which subjects are presented with logical puzzles and asked to solve them: the selection task, syllogisms, the suppression task, conditional reasoning, …? And if our capacity of deduction is not just for performing these tasks, what is it for? What everyday functions does it serve? How are theoretical analyses of deductive performance in these laboratory tasks related to analyses of other cognitive functions?

From the position of being absolutely central in the cognitive revolution, which was founded on conceptions of reasoning, computation and the analysis of language, the psychology of deduction has gone to being the deadbeat of cognitive psychology, pursued in a ghetto, surrounded by widespread scepticism as to whether human reasoning really happens outside the academy. “Isn't what we really do decision?” we increasingly often hear. Many eminent psychology departments do not teach courses on reasoning. Imagine such a psychology department (or indeed any psychology department) not teaching any courses on perception. Even where they do teach reasoning they are more likely to be focused on analogical reasoning, thought of as a kind of reasoning at the opposite end of some dimension of certainty from deduction.

We believe that the reason for this ghettoisation can be traced to a series of assumptions which we will consider shortly. We will argue that the way out of the ghetto is to drop these assumptions, none of which bears scrutiny anyway.

Type
Chapter
Information
Reasoning
Studies of Human Inference and its Foundations
 , pp. 223 - 248
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Book purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Anderson, J. R. and Lebiere, C.. The atomic components of thought. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1998.Google Scholar
Arbib, M. A. and Rizzolatti, G.. Neural expectations: A possible evolutionary path from manual skills to language. Communication and Cognition, 29:393–424, 1997.Google Scholar
Asher, N. and Lascarides, A.. Logics of conversation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Baggio, G., Lambalgen, M., and Hagoort, P.. Computing and recomputing discourse models: An ERP study of the semantics of temporal connectives. Journal of Memory and Language, Submitted.Google Scholar
Barwise, J. and Feferman, S., editors. Model-theoretic logics. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1985.Google Scholar
Bernstein, B.. Class, codes and control: Vol. 1, Theoretical studies towards a sociology of language. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1971.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bienenstock, E. and Malsburg, C. von. A neural network for invariant pattern recognition. Europhysics Letters, 4(1): 121–126, 1987.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bransford, J. D., Banks, J. R., and Franks, J. J.. Sentence memory: A constructive versus an interpretive approach. Cognitive Psychology, 3:193–209, 1972.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Byrne, R. M. J.. Suppressing valid inferences with conditionals. Cognition, 31:61–83, 1989.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Byrne, R. M. J., Espino, O., and Santamaria, C.. Counterexamples and the supression of inferences. Journal of Memory and Language, 40:347–373, 1999.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheng, P. and Holyoak, K.. Pragmatic reasoning schemas. Cognitive Psychology, 14, 1985.Google Scholar
Cheng, P., Holyoak, K., Nisbett, R. E., and Oliver, L. Pragmatic versus syntactic approaches to training deductive reasoning. Cognitive Psychology, 18:293–328, 1986.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chesnevar, C., Maguitman, G., and Loui, R.. Logical models of argument. ACM Computing Surveys, 32:337–383, 2000.CrossRef
Cooper, R. P.. Modelling high-level cognitive processes. Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ, 2002.Google Scholar
Craik, K. J. W.. The nature of explanation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967.Google Scholar
Damasio, A. R.. Descartes' error: Emotion, reason and the human brain. New York: Putnam, 1994.Google Scholar
Evans, J.St.B. T.. In two minds: Dual-process accounts of reasoning. TRENDS in Cognitive Sciences, 7(10): 454–459, 2003.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
S. I. Fillenbaum. How to do some things with if. In Cotton, and Klatzky, , editors, Semantic ‘factors’ in cognition. Hillsdale NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1978.Google Scholar
Fodor, J. A.. The mind doesn't work that way. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2000. In appendix.Google Scholar
Gernsbacher, M. A.. Handbook of psycholinguistics. New York: Academic Press, 1994.Google Scholar
Gigerenzer, G. and Hug, K.. Domain-specific reasoning: Social contracts, cheating, and perspective change. Cognition, 43: 127–171, 1992.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Greenfield, P. M.. Language, tools and the brain: The ontogeny and phylogeny of hierarchically organized sequential behavior. Behavioral and brain sciences, 14:531–595, 1991.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
H. P. Grice. Logic and conversation. In Cole, P. and Morgan, J., editors, Syntax and semantics Vol 3: Speech acts. London: Academic Press, 1975.Google Scholar
Griggs, R. A. and Cox, J. R.. The elusive thematic-materials effect in Wason's selection task. British Journal of Psychology, 73:407–420, 1982.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hölldobler, S. and Kalinke, Y. Towards a massively parallel computational model of logic programming. In Proceedings ECA194 Workshop on combining symbolic and connectionist processing, 68–77. ECAI, 1994.Google Scholar
Johnson-Laird, P. N. and Byrne, R. M.. Deduction. Hove, Sussex: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1991.Google Scholar
Johnson-Laird, P. N., Legrenzi, P., and Legrenzi, M. S.. Reasoning and a sense of reality. British Journal of Psychology, 63:395–, 1972.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
H. Kamp. A theory of truth and semantic representation. In Groenendijk, J., Janssen, T., and Stokhof, M., editors, Formal methods in the study of language. Amsterdam: Mathematical Centre Tracts 135, Amsterdam, 277–322, 1981.Google Scholar
Kamp, H. and Reyle, U.. From Discourse to Logic, Introduction to Modeltheoretic Semantics of Natural Language, Formal Logic and Discourse Representation Theory, Part 1, volume 42 of Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1993.Google Scholar
A. Lechler. Interpretation of conditionals in the suppression task. M.Sc. thesis, HCRC, University of Edinburgh, 2004.
Lehman, D., Lempert, R., and Nisbett, R.. The effects of graduate training on reasoning: Formal discipline and thinking about everyday life events. American Psychologist, 431–442, 1988.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manktelow, K. and Over, D.. Inference and understanding: A philosophical perspective. London: Routledge, 1990.Google Scholar
McCarthy, J.. Circumscription – a form of non-monotonic reasoning. Artficial Intelligence, 13:27–39, 1980.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newell, A. and Simon, H.. Human problem solving. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1972.Google Scholar
Newstead, S.. Interpretational errors in syllogistic reasoning. Journal of Memory and Language, 28:78–91, 1989.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newstead, S.. Gricean implicatures and syllogistic reasoning. Journal of Memory and Language, 34:644–664, 1995.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oaksford, M. R. and Chater, N. C.. A rational analysis of the selection task as optimal data selection. Psychological Review, 101: 608–631, 1994.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reiter, R.. A logic for default reasoning. Artificial Intelligence, 13:81–132, 1980.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, M., Newstead, S., and Griggs, R. A.. Quantifier interpretation and syllogistic reasoning. Thinking and Reasoning, 7(2): 173–204, 2001.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ryle, G.. Dilemmas. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 1954.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
M. Shanahan. Reinventing shakey. In Minker, J., editor, Logic-based artificial intelligence. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2000.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stanovich, K. E.. Who is rational? Studies of individual differences in reasoning. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1999.Google Scholar
Steedman, M.. Plans, affordances and combinatory grammar. Linguistics and Philosophy, 25(5–6): 725–753, 2002.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
K. Stenning. Anaphora as an approach to pragmatics. In Halle, M., Bresnan, J., and Miller, G. A., editors, Linguistic theory and psychological reality. MIT Press, 1978.Google Scholar
K. Stenning. Representation and conceptualisation in educational communication. In Someren, M., Reimann, P., Boshuizen, E., and Jong, T., editors, Learning with multiple representations, Advances in Learning and Instruction, chapter 16, pages 321–334. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1998.Google Scholar
Stenning, K.. Seeing reason. Image and language in learning to think. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stenning, K. and Cox, R.. Rethinking deductive tasks: Relating interpretation and reasoning through individual differences. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 59:1454–1483, 2006.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
K. Stenning and J. Oberlander. Spatial inclusion as an analogy for set membership: A case study of analogy at work. In Holyoak, K. and Barnden, J., editors, Analogical connections, volume 2 of Advances in connectionist and neural computation theory, chapter 9, pages 446–486. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1994.Google Scholar
Stenning, K. and Lambalgen, M.. Human reasoning and cognitive science. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2008.Google Scholar
Stenning, K. and Lambalgen, M.. A little logic goes a long way: Basing experiment on semantic theory in the cognitive science of conditional reasoning. Cognitive Science, 28(4): 481–530, 2004.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stenning, K. and Lambalgen, M.. Semantic interpretation as reasoning in nonmonotonic logic: The real meaning of the suppression task. Cognitive Science, 29(6): 919–960, 2005.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
K. Stenning and M. van Lambalgen. Explaining the domain generality of human cognition. In Roberts, M., editor, Integrating the Mind, chapter 8, pages 179–209, Psychology Press, Hove, Sussex, 2006.Google Scholar
Stenning, K. and Yule, P.. Image and language in human reasoning: A syllogistic illustration. Cognitive Psychology, 34:109–159, 1997.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tanenhaus, M., Spivey-Knowlton, M., Eberhard, K., and Sedivy, J.. Integration of visual and linguistic information in spoken language comprehension. Science, 268:632–634, 1995.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lambalgen, M. and Hamm, F.. The proper treatment of events. Blackwell, Oxford and Boston, 2004.Google Scholar
C. von der Malsburg. The correlation theory of brain function. Internal Report 81–2, Dept. of Neurobiology, Max-Planck-Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Goettingen, Germany, 1981. Reprinted in: Domany, E., Hemmen, J. L. and Schulten, K. (eds.) Models of neural networks II, Springer Verlag, 1994.Google Scholar
Malsburg, C. von. Pattern recognition by labeled graph matching. Neural Networks, Berlin, 1:141–148, 1988.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
C. von der Malsburg. The dynamic link architecture. In Arbib, M. A., editor, The handbook of brain theory and neural networks. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003. 2nd edition.Google Scholar
Malsburg, C. von and Bienenstock, E.. A neural network for the retrieval of superimposed connection patterns. Europhysics Letters, 3(11): 1243–1249, 1987.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malsburg, C. von and Willshaw, D.. Co-operativity and the brain. Trends in Neurosciences, 4(4): 80–83, 1981.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malsburg, C. von and Willshaw, D. J.. How to label nerve cells so that they can interconnect in an ordered fashion. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. U.S.A., 74:5176–5178, 1977.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wason, P. C.. Reasoning about a rule. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 20:273–281, 1968.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
P. C. Wason. Problem solving. In Gregory, R. L., editor, The Oxford Companion to the Mind, pages 641–644. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.Google Scholar
Wason, P. C. and Green, D. W.. Reasoning and mental representation. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 36A:598–611, 1984.Google Scholar
Wason, P. C. and Johnson-Laird, P. N.. A conflict between selecting and evaluating information in an inferential task. British Journal of Psychology, 61(4): 509–515, 1970.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Willshaw, D. J. and Malsburg, C. von. How patterned neural connections can be set up by self-organization. Proceedings Royal Society of London, B194:431–445, 1976.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Willshaw, D. J. and Malsburg, C. von. A marker induction mechanism for the establishment of ordered neural mappings: Its application to the retinotectal problem. Philosophical Transactions of Royal Society of London, B287:203–243, 1979.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×