Students expose various intuitions in probability comparison and calculation tasks. Large volumes of research looked into these intuitions by categorizing learners' strategies, but fewer studies considered how these intuitions may be associated with learners' judgments. Even fewer examined the mixed effects of multiple intuitions held by the same…

People's expectations help them make judgments about the world. In the area of spatial memory, the interaction of existing knowledge with incoming information is best illustrated in the category effect, a bias in positioning a target toward the prototypical location of its region (Huttenlocher et al., 1991). According to Bayesian principles, these…

Four experiments examined the locus of impact of causal knowledge on consideration of alternative hypotheses in judgments under uncertainty. Two possible loci were examined; overcoming neglect of the alternative when developing a representation of a judgment problem and improving utilization of statistics associated with the alternative…

It is argued that causal understanding originates in experiences of acting on objects. Such experiences have consistent features that can be used as clues to causal identification and judgment. These are singular clues, meaning that they can be detected in single instances. A catalog of 14 singular clues is proposed. The clues function as…

People consider alternative causes when deciding whether a cause is responsible for an effect (diagnostic inference) but appear to neglect them when deciding whether an effect will occur (predictive inference). Five experiments were conducted to test a 2-part explanation of this phenomenon: namely, (a) that people interpret standard predictive…

People generally judge that the future will be consistent with their desires, but the reason for this desirability bias is unclear. This investigation examined whether affective reactions associated with future events are the mechanism through which desires influence likelihood judgments. In 4 studies, affective reactions were manipulated for…

Two studies investigated the possibility that assessment of confidence is biased by attempts to justify chosen answers. These attempts include selectively focusing on evidence supporting the chosen answer and disregarding contradictory evidence. Results suggest that confidence depends on the amount and strength of evidence supporting the answer…