Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-07T20:03:59.507Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Rats and infants as propositional reasoners: A plausible possibility?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2009

Leyre Castro  and
Edward A. Wasserman
Leyre Castro
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242. [email protected]@uiowa.eduhttp://www.psychology.uiowa.edu/
Edward A. Wasserman
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242. [email protected]@uiowa.eduhttp://www.psychology.uiowa.edu/
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Mitchell et al. contemplate the possibility of rats being capable of propositional reasoning. We suggest that this is an unlikely and unsubstantiated possibility. Nonhuman animals and human infants do learn about the contingencies in the world; however, such learning seems not to be based on propositional reasoning, but on more elementary associative processes.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , April 2009 , pp. 203 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Beckers, T., Miller, R. R., De Houwer, J. & Urushihara, K. (2006) Reasoning rats: Forward blocking in Pavlovian animal conditioning is sensitive to constraints of causal inference. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 135:92–102.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blaisdell, A., Sawa, K., Leising, K. J. & Waldmann, M. R. (2006) Causal reasoning in rats. Science 311:1020–22.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Braine, M. D. S. (1978) On the relation between the natural logic of reasoning and standard logic. Psychological Review 85:1–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Braine, M. D. S. & Rumain, B. (1983) Logical reasoning. In:Handbook of child psychology: Cognitive development, vol. 3, ed. Flavell, J. H. & Markman, E. M.. Wiley.Google Scholar
Christiansen, M. H., Dale, R. A. C., Ellefson, M. R. & Conway, C. M. (2002) The role of sequential learning in language evolution: Computational and experimental studies. In:Simulating the evolution of language, ed. Cangelosi, A. & Parisi, D., pp. 165–88. Springer-Verlag.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clancy, P., Jacobsen, T. & Silva, M. (1976) The acquisition of conjunction: Across linguistic study. Stanford Papers and Reports on Child Language Development 12:71–80.Google Scholar
De Houwer, J. & Beckers, T. (2003) Secondary task difficulty modulates forward blocking in human contingency learning. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 56B:345–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Falmagne, R. J. (1975) Overview: Reasoning, representation, process, and related issues. In: Reasoning: Representation and process in children and adults, ed. Falmagne, R. J.. Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Goldstone, R. L. & Barsalou, L. W. (1998) Reuniting perception and conception. Cognition 65:231–62.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Haselgrove, M. (under review) Reasoning rats or associative animals? Comment on Beckers, Miller, De Houwer & Urushihara (2006) Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behaviour Processes.Google Scholar
Killeen, P. R. (1981) Learning as causal inference. In:Quantitative analyses of behavior, vol. 1: Discriminative properties of reinforcement schedules, ed. Commons, M. L. & Nevins, J. A., pp. 89–112. Ballinger.Google Scholar
Leech, R., Mareschal, D. & Cooper, R. P. (2008) Analogy as relational priming: A developmental and computational perspective on the origins of a complex cognitive skill. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 31:357–78.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rescorla, R. A. & Wagner, A. R. (1972) A theory of Pavlovian conditioning: Variations in the effectiveness of reinforcement and non-reinforcement. In: Classical conditioning: Current theory and research, vol. 2, ed. Black, A. H. & Prokasy, W. F., pp. 64–99. Appleton-Century-Crofts.Google Scholar
Sobel, D. M. & Kirkham, N. Z. (2006) Blickets and babies: The development of causal reasoning in toddlers and infants. Developmental Psychology 42:1103–15.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed