Examining the rarity assumption and its implications

摘要建议：克雷格·R·M·麦肯齐提出的这项研究的主题是，日常推理行为比之前认为的要准确得多。人不是通用的推理机，而是适应他们通常工作的环境的结构。这使他们能够利用既简单又准确的策略。拟议的实验考察了一个重要的环境特征的作用：数据或观测数据罕见或意想不到的程度。罕见的观察比普通的观察更能提供信息，人们似乎会对哪种事件很少见做出强有力的假设。这些假设在实验室之外是有意义的，有助于解释许多以前的发现，并导致新的预测。拟议中的实验详细检查了人们对稀有性的敏感性，以及对思维和推理研究的几个领域的影响。

AbstractProposal 0079615PI: Craig R. M. McKenzieThe theme of the proposed research is that everyday inferential behavior is much more accurate than previously thought. People are not general-purpose inference machines, but are instead adapted to the structure of the environment in which they typically operate. This allows them to exploit strategies that are both simple and accurate. The proposed experiments examine the role of an important environmental feature: The extent to which a datum, or observation, is rare or unexpected. Rare observations are more informative than common ones, and people appear to make strong assumptions about what kinds of events are rare. These assumptions make sense outside of the laboratory and help explain many previous findings and lead to new predictions. The proposed experiments examine in detail people's sensitivity to rarity and the implications for several areas of research on thinking and reasoning.