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Hoffrage, U. ; Gigerenzer, G. ; Krauss, Stefan ; Martignon, L.

Representation Facilitates Rea-soning: What Natural Frequencies Are and What They Are Not

Hoffrage, U., Gigerenzer, G., Krauss, Stefan and Martignon, L. (2002) Representation Facilitates Rea-soning: What Natural Frequencies Are and What They Are Not. Cognition 84 (3), pp. 343-352.

Date of publication of this fulltext: 16 Aug 2016 10:39
Article
DOI to cite this document: 10.5283/epub.34315


Abstract

A good representation can be crucial for finding the solution to a problem. Gigerenzer and Hoffrage (Psychol. Rev. 102 (1995) 684; Psychol. Rev. 106 (1999) 425) have shown that representations in terms of natural frequencies, rather than conditional probabilities, facilitate the computation of a cause's probability (or frequency) given an effect – a problem that is usually referred to as Bayesian ...

A good representation can be crucial for finding the solution to a problem. Gigerenzer and Hoffrage (Psychol. Rev. 102 (1995) 684; Psychol. Rev. 106 (1999) 425) have shown that representations in terms of natural frequencies, rather than conditional probabilities, facilitate the computation of a cause's probability (or frequency) given an effect – a problem that is usually referred to as Bayesian reasoning. They also have shown that normalized frequencies – which are not natural frequencies – do not lead to computational facilitation, and consequently, do not enhance people's performance. Here, we correct two misconceptions propagated in recent work (Cognition 77 (2000) 197; Cognition 78 (2001) 247; Psychol. Rev. 106 (1999) 62; Organ. Behav. Hum. Decision Process. 82 (2000) 217): normalized frequencies have been mistaken for natural frequencies and, as a consequence, “nested sets” and the “subset principle” have been proposed as new explanations. These new terms, however, are nothing more than vague labels for the basic properties of natural frequencies.



Involved Institutions


Details

Item typeArticle
Journal or Publication TitleCognition
Publisher:Elsevier
Volume:84
Number of Issue or Book Chapter:3
Page Range:pp. 343-352
DateJuly 2002
InstitutionsMathematics > Prof. Dr. Stefan Krauss
Identification Number
ValueType
10.1016/S0010-0277(02)00050-1DOI
WOS:000176306400005Web of Science ID
KeywordsBayesian inference; Probability judgements; Representation of information; Natural frequencies
Dewey Decimal Classification500 Science > 510 Mathematics
StatusPublished
RefereedUnknown
Created at the University of RegensburgUnknown
URN of the UB Regensburgurn:nbn:de:bvb:355-epub-343152
Item ID34315

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