title: Judging the Probability of Hypotheses Versus the Impact of Evidence: Which Form of Inductive Inference Is More Accurate and Time-Consistent?
abstract: Inductive reasoning requires exploiting links between evidence and hypotheses. This can be done focusing either on the posterior probability of the hypothesis when updated on the new evidence or on the impact of the new evidence on the credibility of the hypothesis. But are these two cognitive representations equally reliable? This study investigates this question by comparing probability and impact judgments on the same experimental materials. The results indicate that impact judgments are more consistent in time and more accurate than probability judgments. Impact judgments also predict the direction of errors in probability judgments. These findings suggest that human inductive reasoning relies more on estimating evidential impact than on posterior probability.
authors.affiliation: Center for Mind/Brain Sciences, University of Trento.
authors.forename: Katya
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Tentori
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Science Group, Warwick Business School.
authors.forename: Nick
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Chater
authors.affiliation: Center for Logic, Language, and Cognition, University of Turin.|Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy, Ludwig Maximilian University.
authors.forename: Vincenzo
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Crupi
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D011336:Probability; D013850:Thinking / Q000502:physiology*; D013997:Time Factors; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Confirmation judgments; Confirmation measures; Impact; Inductive reasoning; Inference; Probabilistic reasoning