From Covariation to Causation: A Test of the Assumption of Causal Power

How humans infer causation from covariation has been the subject of a vigorous debate, most recently between the computational causal power account ( P. W. Cheng, 1997 ) and associative learning theorists (e.g., K. Lober & D. R. Shanks, 2000 ). Whereas most researchers in the subject area agree...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition memory, and cognition, 2003-11, Vol.29 (6), p.1119-1140
Main Authors: Buehner, Marc J, Cheng, Patricia W, Clifford, Deborah
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis of Covariance
Analysis of Variance
Animals
Associative Processes
Attribution
Bias
Biological and medical sciences
Causal Analysis
Causality
Cognition & reasoning
Cognition. Intelligence
Cognitive style
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Human
Humans
Inference
Judgment
Probability Learning
Psychology
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Rats
Reasoning. Problem solving
Reference Values
Theories
Vaccination - statistics & numerical data
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Summary:How humans infer causation from covariation has been the subject of a vigorous debate, most recently between the computational causal power account ( P. W. Cheng, 1997 ) and associative learning theorists (e.g., K. Lober & D. R. Shanks, 2000 ). Whereas most researchers in the subject area agree that causal power as computed by the power PC theory offers a normative account of the inductive process, Lober and Shanks, among others, have questioned the empirical validity of the theory. This article offers a full report and additional analyses of the original study featured in Lober and Shanks's critique ( M. J. Buehner & P. W. Cheng, 1997 ) and reports tests of Lober and Shanks's and other explanations of the pattern of causal judgments. Deviations from normativity, including the outcome-density bias, were found to be misperceptions of the input or other artifacts of the experimental procedures rather than inherent to the process of causal induction.
ISSN:0278-7393
1939-1285
DOI:10.1037/0278-7393.29.6.1119