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Adaptive redundancy, denominator neglect, and the base-rate fallacy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 October 2007

Christopher R. Wolfe
Christopher R. Wolfe
Affiliation:
Western College Program, Miami University, Oxford, OH 45056. WolfeCR@muohio.eduhttp://tappan.wcp.muohio.edu/home/
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Abstract

Homo sapiens have evolved a dual-process cognitive architecture that is adaptive but prone to systematic errors. Fuzzy-trace theory predicts that nested or overlapping class-inclusion relations create processing interference, resulting in denominator neglect: behaving as if one ignores marginal denominators in a 2 × 2 table. Ignoring marginal denominators leads to fallacies in base-rate problems and conjunctive and disjunctive probability estimates.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 30 , Issue 3 , June 2007 , pp. 286 - 287
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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