Biomedical subjects

A Winman

Publications and source records attributed to A Winman.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2001

High-level reasoning and base-rate use: do we need cue-competition to explain the inverse base-rate effect?

Previous accounts of the inverse base-rate effect (D. L. Medin & S. M. Edelson, 1988) have revolved around the concept of cue-competition. In this article, the authors propose that high-level reasoning in the form of an eliminative inference mechanism may contribute to the effect. A quantitative implementation of this idea demonstrates that it has the power by itself to produce the pattern of base-rate effects in the Medin and Edelson (1988) design. Four predictions are derived that contradict the predictions by attention to distinctive input (ADIT; J. K. Kruschke, 1996), up to date the most successful account of the inverse base-rate effect. Results from 3 experiments disconfirm the predictions by ADIT and demonstrate the importance of high-level reasoning in designs of the Medin and Edelson kind. Implications for the interpretation of the inverse base-rate effect and the attention-shifting mechanisms presumed by ADIT are discussed.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

Naive empiricism and dogmatism in confidence research: a critical examination of the hard-easy effect.

Two robust phenomena in research on confidence in one's general knowledge are the overconfidence phenomenon and the hard-easy effect. In this article, the authors propose that the hard-easy effect has been interpreted with insufficient attention to the scale-end effects, the linear dependency, and the regression effects in data and that the continued adherence to the idea of a "cognitive overconfidence bias" is mediated by selective attention to particular data sets. A quantitative review of studies with 2-alternative general knowledge items demonstrates that, contrary to widespread belief, there is (a) very little support for a cognitive-processing bias in these data; (b) a difference between representative and selected item samples that is not reducible to the difference in difficulty; and (c) near elimination of the hard-easy effect when there is control for scale-end effects and linear dependency.

Cognition↗

PubMed1998

The Calibration Issue: Theoretical Comments on Suantak, Bolger, and Ferrell (1996).

In this comment on a recent article in this journal on calibration of subjective probabilities by Suantak, Bolger, and Ferrell (1996) we point to methodological problems with the data presented in the article, with computer simulations we demonstrate that the results claimed by the authors to refute the ecological models (Gigerenzer, Hoffrage, & Kleinbölting, 1991; Juslin, 1994) are actually predicted by them, and we respond to the criticisms of the notion of "ecological cue validity." It is further argued that contrary to the claims by the authors: The decision variable partition model advocated by the authors fails to account for the results reported in the article, but there is one error model-the combined error model (Juslin, Olsson, & Björkman, 1997)-that predicts the observed symmetric hard-easy effect with crossover at proportion correct .75. Finally, an analysis of 44 cognitive and 21 sensory tasks demonstrates that there is a difference in calibration for sensory and cognitive tasks. Copyright 1998 Academic Press.

Journal Article↗

PubMed1996

Underconfidence in sensory discrimination: the interaction between experimental setting and response strategies.

In a recent issue of this journal, Baranski and Petrusic (1994) presented emperical data revealing overconfidence in sensory discrimination. In this paper, we propose an explanation of Baranski and Petrusic's results, based on an idiosyncrasy in the experimental setting that misleads subjects who are using an unwarranted symmetry assumption. Experiment 1 showed that when this hypothesis is controlled for, a large underconfidence bias is obtained with Baranski and Petrusic's procedure. The results of Experiment 2 confirmed that overconfidence is difficult to obtain in subject-controlled sensory discrimination tasks, even for a very low proportion of correct responses. The different results obtained in sensory and cognitive tasks suggest that one should not uncritically draw parallels between confidence in sensory and cognitive judgments.

Adult↗

PubMed1995

Can overconfidence be used as an indicator of reconstructive rather than retrieval processes?

In a recent paper Wagenaar (1988) suggested that overconfidence can be used as an indicator of reconstructive processes which allow responses based on inference to be distinguished from responses based on retrieval. The ecological models (Björkman, in press; Gigerenzer, Hoffrage, & Kleinbölting, 1991; Juslin, 1993a, 1993b, 1994) provide a more positive view of the calibration of reconstructive responses. In this paper we compare these two views and argue that overconfidence cannot be considered a reliable indicator of reconstructive processes since people may be well calibrated for tasks that require inference, provided that tasks are selected in offunbiased manner. Instead, we discuss two different models: the response-independence model which is appropriate to retrieval, and the response-dependence model which applies to inference. These two models predict different distributions of solution probabilities and they therefore provide a criterion by which we can distinguish between direct retrieval and reconstruction. In two empirical studies modelled after Experiment 1 in Wagenaar's (1988) paper it is shown that calibration can be very similar and quite reasonable both for tasks that are dominated by inference and tasks that are dominated by retrieval processes. In Experiment 2 we show that the two conditions nevertheless differ in regard to the distributions of solution probabilities in the manner predicted by the two response models presented in the paper. It is proposed that the issue of which is the most appropriate interpretation of solution probabilities is neglected, and that the criterion should be of interest also to applications outside the domain of calibration research.

Adult↗

PubMed1993

Realism of confidence in sensory discrimination: the underconfidence phenomenon.

This paper documents a very pervasive underconfidence bias in the area of sensory discrimination. In order to account for this phenomenon, a subjective distance theory of confidence in sensory discrimination is proposed. This theory, based on the law of comparative judgment and the assumption of confidence as an increasing function of the perceived distance between stimuli, predicts underconfidence--that is, that people should perform better than they express in their confidence assessments. Due to the fixed sensitivity of the sensory system, this underconfidence bias is practically impossible to avoid. The results of Experiment 1 confirmed the prediction of underconfidence with the help of present-day calibration methods and indicated a good quantitative fit of the theory. The results of Experiment 2 showed that prolonged experience of outcome feedback (160 trials) had no effect on underconfidence. It is concluded that the subjective distance theory provides a better explanation of the underconfidence phenomenon than do previous accounts in terms of subconscious processes.

Adult↗