title: Violations of coherence in subjective probability: a representational and assessment processes account.
abstract: Coherent judgment is a cardinal feature of rational cognition. Six experiments revealed systematic violations of coherence in probability judgment in which participants assigned different probabilities to mathematically equiprobable events. Experiments 1-5 revealed a strict refocusing effect: Compared to an occurrence frame, a non-occurrence frame resulted in higher estimates if base-rate evidence favored occurrence, lower estimates if evidence favored non-occurrence, and similar estimates if evidence supported indifference. Moreover, Experiments 5 and 6 revealed a pessimistic bias in which the less favorable of two equiprobable events was assigned greater probability. The findings support a Representational and Assessment Processes account (RAP) in which subjective probability is influenced by the perceived compatibility between representations of focal events and representations of evidence.
authors.affiliation: Defence Research and Development Canada and Department of Psychology, University of Toronto, 1133 Sheppard Avenue West, P.O. Box 2000, Toronto, Ont., Canada M3M 3B9. mandel@psych.utoronto.ca
authors.forename: David R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Mandel
mesh_terms: D001288:Attention; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment; D011337:Probability Learning; D011340:Problem Solving