CAUSAL-MODELS AND THE ACQUISITION OF CATEGORY STRUCTURE

被引:101
作者
WALDMANN, MR [1 ]
HOLYOAK, KJ [1 ]
FRATIANNE, A [1 ]
机构
[1] UNIV CALIF LOS ANGELES, DEPT PSYCHOL, LOS ANGELES, CA 90024 USA
关键词
D O I
10.1037/0096-3445.124.2.181
中图分类号
B84 [心理学];
学科分类号
04 ; 0402 ;
摘要
This article proposes that learning of categories based on cause-effect relations is guided by causal models. In addition to incorporating domain-specific knowledge, causal models can be based on knowledge of such general structural properties as the direction of the causal arrow and the variability of causal variables. Five experiments tested the influence of common-cause models and common-effect models on the ease of learning linearly separable and nonlinearly separable categories. The results show that causal models guide the interpretation of otherwise identical learning inputs, and that learning difficulty is determined by the fit between the structural implications of the causal models and the structure of the learning domain. These influences of the general properties of causal models were obtained across several different content domains, including domains for which subjects lacked prior knowledge.
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收藏
页码:181 / 206
页数:26
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