Conditional reasoning under time constraint: Information retrieval and inhibition

Hugues Lortie-Forgues, Henry Markovits

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

A total of 152 students were asked to respond to a series of causal conditional ("If P then Q") inferences with major premises for which there was variable access to information contradicting the premises. Half the students were given 12.5 s for each inference, the other half were given 8.5 s. The percentage of accepted inferences was significantly lower when the time was shorter for the MP and MT inferences, but no effect was observed for the AC and DA inferences. Results are interpreted as supporting the idea that inhibition of retrieved information contradicting the premise is necessary to explain reasoning with the MP and MT inferences under logical instructions (Markovits & Barrouillet, 2002).

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)221-232
Number of pages12
JournalThinking and Reasoning
Volume16
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2010

Keywords

  • Inhibition
  • Reasoning
  • Time constraint

Cite this