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Cited by 272Education and Critical Thinking DevelopmentEducational Strategies and EpistemologiesDecision-Making and Behavioral Economics

Teaching Reasoning

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Nisbett, Richard E., Fong, Geoffrey T., Lehman, Darrin R., Cheng, Patricia W.·1987·Science
DOI 10.1126/science.3672116
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Abstract

Twentieth-century psychologists have been pessimistic about teaching reasoning, prevailing opinion suggesting that people may possess only domain-specific rules, rather than abstract rules; this would mean that training a rule in one domain would not produce generalization to other domains. Alternatively, it was thought that people might possess abstract rules (such as logical ones) but that these are induced developmentally through self-discovery methods and cannot be trained. Research suggests a much more optimistic view: even brief formal training in inferential rules may enhance their use for reasoning about everyday life events. Previous theorists may have been mistaken about trainability, in part because they misidentified the kind of rules that people use naturally.

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Research works printed but not linked: 16

  1. For a review, see C. Brainerd, Piage's Theory of Inteeliqence (Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1978).
  2. P. Cheng and K. Holyoak, Cognit. Pychol. 17, 391 (1985);
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  11. G. Fong, D. Krantz, R. Nisbett, Cognit. PRychol. 18, 253 (1986).
  12. P. Cheng and K. Holyoak, Cognit. Psychol. 17, 391 (1985).
  13. ___ L. Oliver, R. Nisbett, ibid. 18, 293 (1986).
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Authors
Nisbett, R. E., Fong, G. T., Lehman, D. R., & Cheng, P. W.
Affiliations
University of Michigan (US)
ORCID
Fong, Geoffrey T.
Venue
Science
Publisher
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Published
1987-10-30
Volume
238
Issue
4827
Pages
625-631
ISSN
  • 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
  • 1095-9203
DOI
10.1126/science.3672116
OpenAlex
W4249755205
Cited by
272
References
11
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 7 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 7 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 5 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 10 · 2012: 1
FWCI
50.47
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Science (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Deep Blue (University of Michigan) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • National Institutes of Health (5r01mh038466-03)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (1 RO1 MH38466)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Education › Education and Critical Thinking Development
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Educational Strategies and Epistemologies
  • Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › General Decision Sciences › Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics
Keywords
reasoning, reasoning training, inference rules, abstract rules, domain-specific rules, transfer of training, rule induction, formal instruction, everyday reasoning
MeSH terms
Education, Humans, Learning, Logic, Statistics as Topic

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