The effect of direct training with feedback on a base-rate problem of the engineers-lawyers type is assessed. Analysis indicates that feedback leads to adjusted probability estimates closer to the Bayesian norm than those in the no-feedback training-only condition. For a second base-rate problem (the so called “divorce problem”), however, no effect of training was shown, even though thinking-aloud protocols for this problem showed that subjects mentioned base-rates more often in the feedback than in the no-treatment condition.
References
1.
BorgidaE.BrekkeN. (1982) The base rate fallacy in attribution and prediction. In HarveyJ. H.IckesW.KiddR. F. (Eds.), New directions in attribution research. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Pp. 63–96.
2.
FongG. T.KrantzD. H.NisbettR. E. (1986) The effects of statistical training in thinking about everyday problems. Cognitive Psychology, 18, 253–292.
3.
KahnemanD.TverskyA. (1973) On the psychology of prediction. Psychological Review, 80, 237–251.
4.
KlaymanJ. (1983) Learning from feedback in probabilistic environments. Acta Psychologica, 56, 81–92.
5.
ManisM.DovalinaI.AvisN. E.CardozeS. (1980) Base rates can affect individual predictions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 38, 231–248.
6.
NisbettR. E.KrantzD. H.JepsonC.KundaZ. (1983) The use of statistical heuristics in everyday inductive reasoning. Psychological Review, 90, 339–363.
7.
NisbettR. E.RossL. (1980) Human inference: Strategies and shortcomings of social judgment. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
8.
ZukierH.PepitoneA. (1984) Social roles and strategies in prediction: Some determinants of the use of base-rate information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 42, 349–360.
