Using Insights from Psychology and Language to Improve How People Reason with Description Logics

Inspired by insights from theories of human reasoning and language, we propose additions to the Manchester OWL Syntax to improve comprehensibility. These additions cover: functional and inverse functional properties, negated conjunction, the definition of exceptions, and existential and universal restrictions. By means of an empirical study, we demonstrate the effectiveness of a number of these additions, in particular: the use of solely to clarify the uniqueness of the object in a functional property; the replacement of and with intersection in conjunction, which was particularly beneficial in negated conjunction; the use of except as a substitute for and not; and the replacement of some with including and only with noneOrOnly, which helped in certain situations to clarify the nature of these restrictions

Mental representation of counterfactual thinking: from iconic minimum to abstract maximum

The aim of this contribution is to provide a state-of-the-art concerned with the mental representation of counterfactual thinking. Counterfactuals are defined from the perspective of cognitive psychology as reasoning processes that consider alternative situations to a factual situation. That is, counterfactual thoughts are conditional thoughts that negate a given fact. Therefore, the key problem of counterfactual mental representation is the representation of negation, its mental modeling and derived inferences. In this context, four prominent findings and three main open issues are revised. Our main conclusion states that counterfactual representation is a function of working memory load and probably operates on the basis of an abstraction gradient. That is, iconic representations might suffice for lower loads and abstract representations might be required for higher working memory loads. Suggestions for a research agenda on counterfactuals are presented. Such agenda is concerned with further theoretical developments and experimental adjustments.Fil: Macbeth, Guillermo Eduardo. Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina "Santa María de los Buenos Aires". Facultad Teresa de Ávila. Centro de Investigación Interdisciplinar en Valores, Integración y Desarrollo Social; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Razumiejczyk, Eugenia. Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina "Santa María de los Buenos Aires". Facultad Teresa de Ávila. Centro de Investigación Interdisciplinar en Valores, Integración y Desarrollo Social; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

The shallow processing of logical negation

The aim of this study is to introduce a novel reasoning phenomenon concerned with the shallow processing of negation in the context of sentential reasoning. By analogy to other psychological explanations that account for superficial responses with conditionals, this study proposes an account for biconditionals derived from a recent theory of negation. This theory predicts that the psychological use of negation returns small scope products. This would happen because the human mind tends to avoid the working memory overload by simplifying its reasoning processes. A within-subjects experimental design was applied to test this conjecture. Results were consistent with such small scope negation prediction. The obtained evidence extends the observation of shallow reasoning processes to the negation of conjunctions and disjunctions that take the form of biconditionals. The results of this study support a mental models approach to account for the psychology of logical negation.Fil: Macbeth, Guillermo Eduardo. Universidad Nacional de Entre Rios; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Razumiejczyk, Eugenia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Entre Rios; ArgentinaFil: Crivello, María del Carmen. Universidad Nacional de Entre Rios; ArgentinaFil: Fioramonti, Mauro Bruno. Universidad Nacional de Entre Rios; ArgentinaFil: Pereyra Girardi, Carolina Iris. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentin

The usability of description logics: understanding the cognitive difficulties presented by description logics

Description Logics have been extensively studied from the viewpoint of decidability and computational tractability. Less attention has been given to their usability and the cognitive difficulties they present, in particular for those who are not specialists in logic. This paper reports on a study into the difficulties associated with the most commonly used Description Logic features. Psychological theories are used to take account of these. Whilst most of the features presented no difficulty to participants, the comprehension of some was affected by commonly occurring misconceptions. The paper proposes explanations and remedies for some of these difficulties. In addition, the time to confirm stated inferences was found to depend both on the maximum complexity of the relations involved and the number of steps in the argument

Mental models for the negation of conjunctions and disjunctions

This study investigates why reasoning that involves negation is extremely difficult. We presented participants with reasoning problems containing sentences with negation of conjunctions and disjunctions in order to test predictions derived from the Mental Models Theory of human thought. According to this theory, reasoning consists of representing and comparing possibilities. Different sentential forms would require different cognitive demands. In particular, responses to a sentential negation task would be modulated by working memory load. This prediction would hold for correct responses but also for the general pattern of responses that includes incorrect responses when the task offers different response options. A within-subjects experimental design with selection paradigm was applied to test these predictions. Experimental comparisons and a complementary descriptive study yielded evidence consistent with the theory-driven predictions derived from the Mental Models Theory. The working memory load was critical for the modulation of correct responses and overall responses. We discussed alternative accounts, and suggested additional predictions for further evaluation of these phenomena

Improving comprehension of Knowledge Representation languages: a case study with Description Logics

Knowledge representation languages are frequently difficult to understand, particularly for those not trained in formal logic. This is the case for Description Logics, which have been adopted for knowledge representation on the Web and in a number of application areas. This work looks at the difficulties experienced with Description Logics; and in particular with the widely-used Manchester OWL Syntax, which employs natural language keywords. The work comprises three studies. The first two identify a number of difficulties which users experience, e.g. with negated intersection, functional properties, the use of subproperties and restrictions. Insights from cognitive psychology and the study of language are applied to understand these difficulties. Whilst these difficulties are in part inherent in reasoning about logic, and Description Logics in particular, they are made worse by the syntax. In the third study, alternative syntactic constructs are proposed which demonstrate some improvement in accuracy and efficiency of comprehension. In addition to proposing alternative syntactic constructs, the work makes some suggestions regarding training and support systems for Description Logics

Human Reasoning and Description Logics: Applying Psychological Theory to Understand and Improve the Usability of Description Logics

Description Logics (DLs) are now the most commonly used ontology languages, in part because of the development of the Web Ontology Language (OWL) standards. Yet it is accepted that DLs are difficult to comprehend and work with, particularly for ontology users who are not computer scientists. The Manchester OWL Syntax (MOS) was developed to make DLs more accessible, by using English keywords in place of logic symbols or formal language. Nevertheless, DLs continue to present difficulties, even when represented in MOS. There has been some investigation of what features cause difficulties, specifically in the context of understanding how an entailment (i.e. an inference) follows from a justification (i.e. a minimal subset of the ontology that is sufficient for the entailment to hold), as is required when debugging an ontology. However, there has been little attempt to relate these difficulties to how people naturally reason and use language. This dissertation draws on theories of reasoning from cognitive psychology, and also insights from the philosophy of language, to understand the difficulties experienced with DLs and to make suggestions to mitigate those difficulties. The language features investigated were those known to be commonly used, both on the basis of analyses reported in the literature and after a survey of ontology users. Two experimental studies investigated participants’ ability to reason with DL statements. These studies demonstrate that insights from psychology and the philosophy of language can be used both to understand the difficulties experienced and to make proposals to mitigate those difficulties. The studies suggest that people reason using both the manipulation of syntax and the representation of semantics with mental models; both approaches can lead to errors. Particular difficulties were associated with: functional object properties; negated conjunction; the interaction of negation and the existential or universal restrictions; and nested restrictions. Proposals to mitigate these difficulties include the adoption of new language keywords; tool enhancement, e.g. to provide syntactically alternative expressions; and the introduction during training both of De Morgan’s Laws for conjunction and disjunction, and their analogues for existential and universal restrictions. A third study then investigated the effectiveness of the proposed new keywords; finding that these keywords could mitigate some of the difficulties experienced. Apart from the immediate applicability of these results to DLs, the approach taken in this dissertation could be extended widely to computer languages, including languages for interacting with databases and with Linked Data. Additionally, based on the experience of the three studies, the dissertation makes some methodological recommendations which are relevant to a range of human-computer interaction studies

Estereotipos sociales y uso de modelos mentales semánticos. Implicaciones didácticas para la formación ciudadana

El presente trabajo pretende analizar, por un lado, los modelos mentales semánticos subyacentes que predominan en los discursos de un grupo de estudiantes universitarios en relación con algunos colectivos vulnerables en el contexto chileno y, por otro lado, detectar cómo éstos inciden en la construcción de estereotipos sociales. Al mismo tiempo, revisamos las posibles implicaciones didácticas que presenta la detección de modelos mentales semánticos con respecto al desarrollo de la competencia social, ciudadana e intercultural, así como sus aportaciones prácticas para la formación ciudadana desde el planteamiento de la didáctica de las Ciencias Sociales. El enfoque metodológico es cualitativo y su aplicación es el estudio de caso en educación con el compromiso epistemológico del constructivismo. Las técnicas de investigación utilizadas para la recogida de datos fueron la prueba basada en las versiones del “Problema de Linda”, el cuestionario abierto, la entrevista en profundidad, la observación participante y los grupos de discusión. Las técnicas de análisis aplicadas fueron el análisis de contenido convencional de Hsieh y Shannon (2005) y la propuesta de análisis de contenido inductivo de Cho y Lee (2014). Además de la detección de modelos mentales semánticos fundamentada en los estudios de Johnson-Laird (1983, 2006, 2010; Orenes y Johnson-Laird, 2012; Khemlani, Barbey y Johnson-Laird, 2014). Los resultados indican que es posible detectar los modelos mentales semánticos en los discursos de los jóvenes y, además, que la mayoría de sus respuestas se vinculan con los estereotipos relacionados con el género, la edad, la etnia y las ocupaciones. Del análisis presentado, cabe concluir que los estereotipos responden a una sola posibilidad o modelo mental semántico que acepta la información presente en sus creencias explícitas e implícitas. Se estima, además, que es posible la detección de modelos mentales semánticos en el análisis de creencias referidas al mundo social, así como su incorporación en propuestas sobre temáticas propias de la formación ciudadana y la didáctica de las Ciencias Sociales. Palabras clave: Modelos mentales semánticos, colectivos vulnerables, estereotipos sociales, formación ciudadana, didáctica de las Ciencias Sociales. ABSTRACT This work is intended to analyse, on the one hand, the underlying semantic mental models that are present to a greater extent in the discourses about some vulnerable groups in the Chilean context provided by university students, and, on the other hand, to detect how such models have an influence on the construction of social stereotypes. At the same time, I review the possible didactic consequences of the identification of semantic mental models with regard to the development of the social, civic, and intercultural competences, as well as their practical inputs for Citizenship Education from the approach of the Didactics of Social Sciences. The methodological approach is qualitative and based on the case study in education with epistemological commitment to constructivism. The techniques used for data collection were versions of “Linda Problem”, open-ended questionnaries, in-depth interviews, participant observation, and focus group discussions. The analytical techniques applied were that of the conventional content analysis provided by Hsieh & Shannon (2005), and that of the approach to qualitative content analysis given by Cho & Lee (2014). In addition, to detect the semantic models, studies such as those of Johnson- Laird (1983, 2006, 2010; Orenes y Johnson-Laird, 2012; Khemlani, Barbey y Johnson-Laird, 2014) were considered. The results suggest that it is possible to detect semantic models in the discourse of young people, and that most of their responses are linked to stereotypes based on gender, age, ethnicity and employment. From the above analysis one can conclude that the stereotypes correspond to only one possibility or semantic mental model related to information that is present in beliefs that the students already implicitly and explicitly hold. Besides, it can be thought that the detection of semantic mental models in analysis referred to social world and their incorporation into proposals for the topics of Citizenship Education and Didactics on Social Sciences are possible. Keywords: Semantic mental models, vulnerable groups, social stereotypes, Citizenship Education, Didactics on Social Sciences