Consequential conditionals: invited and suppressed inferences from valued outcomes.

Consequential conditionals are defined as "if P then Q" statements, where P is an action, and Q a predicted outcome of this action, which is either desirable or undesirable to the agent. Experiment 1 shows that desirable (viz. undesirable) outcomes invite an inference to the truth (viz. falsity) of their antecedent. Experiment 2 shows that the more extreme the outcome is, the stronger the invited inference is. Experiment 3 shows that modus ponens from premises "If A then C, A" can be suppressed with the introduction of a consequential conditional, "If C then Q," where Q is an undesirable outcome. Experiment 4 shows that the more undesirable Q is, the larger the suppression is. The authors discuss how these results can enrich current approaches of conditional inference on the basis of mental models, complementary necessary conditions, and conditional probabilities.

[1]  V. Thompson.  CONDITIONAL REASONING: THE NECESSARY AND SUFFICIENT CONDITIONS , 1995 .

[2]  Ruth M. J. Byrne,et al.  Counterexamples and the Suppression of Inferences , 1999 .

[3]  Jean-François Bonnefon,et al.  The suppression of Modus Ponens as a case of pragmatic preconditional reasoning , 2002 .

[4]  Valerie A. Thompson,et al.  Interpretational factors in conditional reasoning , 1994, Memory & cognition.

[5]  P. Johnson-Laird,et al.  Conditionals: A Theory of Meaning, Pragmatics, and Inference , 2002 .

[6]  G. Gigerenzer,et al.  Domain-specific reasoning: Social contracts, cheating, and perspective change , 1992, Cognition.

[7]  Guy Politzer,et al.  Deductive reasoning from uncertain conditionals. , 2002, British journal of psychology.

[8]  N Chater,et al.  Probabilities and polarity biases in conditional inference. , 2000, Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition.

[9]  Richard E. Grandy,et al.  Conditional Assertions and “Biscuit” Conditionals , 1999 .

[10]  Nick Chater,et al.  Probabilities and Pragmatics in Conditional Inference: Suppression and Order Effects , 2003 .

[11]  Sieghard Beller,et al.  How Knowledge Interferes with Reasoning – Suppression Effects by Content and Context , 2020, Proceedings of the Twenty First Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society.

[12]  A. Garnham,et al.  Thinking and Reasoning , 1994 .

[13]  Christian George,et al.  Reasoning From Uncertain Premises , 1997 .

[14]  L. Macchi,et al.  Thinking : psychological perspectives on reasoning, judgment and decision making , 2005 .

[15]  G. Gigerenzer.  The Taming of Content: Some Thoughts About Domains and Modules , 1995 .

[16]  G. F. Schueler.  Practical Reasoning: Goal-Driven, Knowledge-Based, Action-Guiding Argumentation , 1991 .

[17]  Rosemary J. Stevenson,et al.  Deduction from Uncertain Premises , 1995 .

[18]  Jonathan Baron,et al.  Nonconsequentialist decisions. Commentaries. Author's reply , 1994 .

[19]  F. Chua,et al.  Suppression of valid inferences: syntactic views, mental models, and relative salience , 1994, Cognition.

[20]  Holly P. Branigan,et al.  Proceedings of the 21st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society , 1999 .

[21]  Ruth M. J. Byrne,et al.  Reasoning with deontic and counterfactual conditionals , 2003 .

[22]  Walter Schaeken,et al.  Strategies during complex conditional inferences , 2000 .

[23]  C. George.  Facilitation in the Wason selection task with a consequent referring to an unsatisfactory outcome , 1991 .

[24]  G. d'Ydewalle,et al.  Does pure water boil, when it's heated to 100°C?: The associative Strength of Disabling Conditions in Conditional Reasoning , 2001 .

[25]  R. Byrne.  Suppressing valid inferences with conditionals , 1989, Cognition.