Wason Selection
From MerrimackWiki
Contents |
Experiment Summary
.On each trial, you were given a rule and shown four cards. You were asked to pick two cards to decide if the rule is being violated. Subjects are aware that on the particular set of cards, each one has a letter on one side and a number on the other side.
Independent Variable(s)
.The independent variable was whether the rule was abstract or thematic
Dependent Measure(s)
.The dependent variable is the proportion of rules correctly tested.
Expected Results
.You should find that you did better on the thematic rules than on the abstract rules. In the thematic case, your knowledge of the world should help you arrive at a correct solution, whereas you have no knowledge to help in the abstract case and must rely solely on logic.
Theoretical Significance
The table shows the number of rules correctly tested for the abstract and thematic questions. The maximum number of rules to test is six. The expectation is that people will do better on the thematic than abstract questions.
If the effect exists, it may be stronger for the group or global averages than for your individual data.
