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Reasoning about apparent contradictions: resolution strategies and positive–negative asymmetries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 June 1999

DEAN SHARPE  and
GUY LACROIX
DEAN SHARPE
Affiliation:
McGill University
GUY LACROIX
Affiliation:
McGill University
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Abstract

APPARENT CONTRADICTIONS, e.g. Did Susan like her supper? – Yes and no, involve asserting and denying the same proposition. They therefore violate the classical LAW OF NON-CONTRADICTION, suggesting the use of non-classical INTERPRETIVE STRUCTURES in natural language and reasoning. Experiment 1 explores the range of such interpretive structures available to adults (n = 24) in their reasoning about an apparent contradiction. Experiment 2 uses a similar task to study the emergence of these interpretive structures in young children's reasoning (3;6 to 8;4, n = 48). Results suggest an early facility with resolution strategies relating to OBJECT STRUCTURE (as in, Maybe Susan liked one part of supper but didn't like another part) and an initial tendency to focus on the negative by referring to it first (as in, Maybe Susan didn't like one part of supper but did like another part). We discuss the results in terms of the NATURAL LOGIC of objects and their properties, and the LOGICAL RESOURCES available to young children.

Type
NOTES
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , June 1999 , pp. 477 - 490
Copyright
© 1999 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

This research was supported by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Doctoral Fellowship and a J. W. McConnell Memorial McGill Major Fellowship to Dean Sharpe, and by a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada grant to John Macnamara, Gonzalo Reyes, Michael Makkai, and Brendan Gillon. Portions of this paper were presented at the 20th Annual Boston University Conference on Language Development, Boston, MA, November, 1995 and at the 9th Biennial University of Waterloo Conference on Child Development, Waterloo, ON, May, 1996. We would like to thank the staff, parents, and children of FACE Primary School, McGill University Family Centre and KIDS Westmount Day Care Centre. We would also like to thank Marc Fournier and Dan Purdy for their help in coding data, and two anonymous referees for invaluable comments on an earlier draft of this paper.