More than Feature Comparison : Processes Underlying Similarity and Probability Judgment

Explanations of many cognitive processes, including probability judgment, rely on the construct of similarity. The present paper is concerned with the similarity-based explanation of reasoning in the conjunction task. Although high positive correlations have been found between similarity and probability judgments in this task, these alone cannot validate the assumption that similarity is judged by a process of feature comparison or that similarity judgment is an explanation of probability judgment. Preliminary results from a study in which we collected written justifications from subjects who made both types of judgment suggest that these assumptions are not tenable. Subjects cited considerations of causality and statistics ~ not just feature overlap -- when judging both similarity and probability, indicating that (1) feature comparison is only one way in which people judge similarity and (2) similarity judgment can involve processes usually associated with probability judgment. These findings suggest that the role of similarity in explaining other cognitive processes needs to be revised. It is proposed that the power of similarity and probability to predict one another can be exploited for the purpose of making either type of judgment

Information Asymmetries between Parents and Educators in German Childcare Institutions

Economic theory predicts market failure in the market for early childhood education and care (ECEC) due to information asymmetries. We empirically investigate information asymmetries between parents and ECEC professionals in Germany, making use of a unique extension of the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP). It allows us to compare quality perceptions by parents and pedagogic staff of 734 ECEC institutions which were attended by children in SOEP households. Parents and staff were asked to rate the same quality measures. We detect considerable information asymmetries between these groups which differ across quality measures but little by parental socio-economic background or center characteristics. Our findings imply that information is not readily available to parents, an issue that should be addressed by policy-makers

Priming Analogical Reasoning with False Memories

Like true memories, false memories are capable of priming answers to insight-based problems. Recent research has attempted to extend this paradigm to more advanced problem-solving tasks, including those involving verbal analogical reasoning. However, these experiments are constrained inasmuch as problem solutions could be generated via spreading activation mechanisms (much like false memories themselves) rather than using complex reasoning processes. In three experiments we examined false memory priming of complex analogical reasoning tasks in the absence of simple semantic associations. In Experiment 1, we demonstrated the robustness of false memory priming in analogical reasoning when backward associative strength among the problem terms was eliminated. In Experiments 2a and 2b, we extended these findings by demonstrating priming on newly created homonym analogies that can only be solved by inhibiting semantic associations within the analogy. Overall, the findings of the present experiments provide evidence that the efficacy of false memory priming extends to complex analogical reasoning problems