Pub Date : 2025-11-21DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106380
Ryan M. Barker , Michael J. Armson , Nicholas B. Diamond , Zhong-Xu Liu , Yushu Wang , Jennifer D. Ryan , Brian Levine
Autobiographical memory entails the reconstructing of the visual features of past events. While eye movements are associated with vivid autobiographical recollection, this research has yet to capitalize on the high temporal resolution of eye-tracking data. We aligned eye movement data with participants' extemporaneous free recall of a verified real-life event, allowing us to assess the temporal correspondence of saccades to production of episodic and non-episodic narrative content at the millisecond level. Episodic autobiographical details were preceded by an increase in saccade frequency and followed by a reduction in saccades prior to the next detail. There was no such effect observed for non-episodic details. Oculomotor responses in the temporal window preceding freely-recalled details may facilitate recollection by reinstating spatiotemporal context, or they may reflect post-retrieval processes—or a combination of both—in cyclical sensory-motor-mnemonic interactions that promote vivid recall.
{"title":"Remembrance with gazes passed: Eye movements precede continuous recall of episodic details of real-life events","authors":"Ryan M. Barker , Michael J. Armson , Nicholas B. Diamond , Zhong-Xu Liu , Yushu Wang , Jennifer D. Ryan , Brian Levine","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106380","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106380","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Autobiographical memory entails the reconstructing of the visual features of past events. While eye movements are associated with vivid autobiographical recollection, this research has yet to capitalize on the high temporal resolution of eye-tracking data. We aligned eye movement data with participants' extemporaneous free recall of a verified real-life event, allowing us to assess the temporal correspondence of saccades to production of episodic and non-episodic narrative content at the millisecond level. Episodic autobiographical details were preceded by an increase in saccade frequency and followed by a reduction in saccades prior to the next detail. There was no such effect observed for non-episodic details. Oculomotor responses in the temporal window preceding freely-recalled details may facilitate recollection by reinstating spatiotemporal context, or they may reflect post-retrieval processes—or a combination of both—in cyclical sensory-motor-mnemonic interactions that promote vivid recall.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106380"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145579882","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-20DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106376
Xiaozhi Yang , Elizabeth E. Riggs , Jason C. Coronel , Ian Krajbich
There are many factors that can influence a voter’s decision in the ballot booth but not all of them are policy related. One non-policy factor that may influence voters is the tendency to choose options that attract attention. Here, we investigate this possibility in two proof-of-concept laboratory studies with people choosing between proposed laws. We find that people are slower to vote when their party is split over an issue, and that they tend to vote for laws that they look at more. Moreover, this gaze effect is stronger for more important issues. We also find that we can increase the probability that someone will vote for one of two laws by getting them to look at that option first. Our work harnesses the power of sequential sampling models to explain the relationship between gaze and vote choice. We find support for a goal-based model where overt attention amplifies information supporting a particular law. This model explains why gaze has a stronger effect on choice for more important issues. Our findings indicate that some voting decisions are not predetermined and instead rely on an on-the-spot evaluation. As a result, these decisions can be swayed by attentional manipulations. Thus, visual attention may serve as a unifying framework for understanding different biases that occur in the voting booth, such as ballot-order and candidate-name-familiarity effects.
{"title":"Issue importance amplifies the effect of gaze on voting decisions","authors":"Xiaozhi Yang , Elizabeth E. Riggs , Jason C. Coronel , Ian Krajbich","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106376","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106376","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>There are many factors that can influence a voter’s decision in the ballot booth but not all of them are policy related. One non-policy factor that may influence voters is the tendency to choose options that attract attention. Here, we investigate this possibility in two proof-of-concept laboratory studies with people choosing between proposed laws. We find that people are slower to vote when their party is split over an issue, and that they tend to vote for laws that they look at more. Moreover, this gaze effect is stronger for more important issues. We also find that we can increase the probability that someone will vote for one of two laws by getting them to look at that option first. Our work harnesses the power of sequential sampling models to explain the relationship between gaze and vote choice. We find support for a goal-based model where overt attention amplifies information supporting a particular law. This model explains why gaze has a stronger effect on choice for more important issues. Our findings indicate that some voting decisions are not predetermined and instead rely on an on-the-spot evaluation. As a result, these decisions can be swayed by attentional manipulations. Thus, visual attention may serve as a unifying framework for understanding different biases that occur in the voting booth, such as ballot-order and candidate-name-familiarity effects.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106376"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145574811","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-20DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106337
Pascale Willemsen, Lucien Baumgartner
Moore’s Paradox—e.g., “It’s raining but I don’t think it’s raining”—is widely considered infelicitous despite being logically consistent. In this paper, we extend Moore’s Paradox to moral discourse and test whether moral statements like “Murder is wrong but I don’t disapprove of it” elicit similar intuitions. Rooted in moral expressivism, the Parity Thesis predicts that moral assertions express non-cognitive attitudes (e.g., approval/disapproval) in a manner analogous to how descriptive statements express beliefs. In a pre-registered study with 1200 participants, we empirically test this thesis using a mixed design that manipulates moral term type (thick vs thin), evaluative polarity (positive vs negative), perspective (first vs third person), and attitude (belief vs disapproval). The results of our main study and one qualitative follow-up study suggest that while moral statements resemble Moorean Paradoxes in important ways, participants find it largely acceptable to call an action wrong without disapproving of it. As the infelicity of such statements is a core ingredient of Moorean Paradoxes and, as we suggest, the Parity Thesis, we conclude that moral language does not express approval and disapproval like declarative language expresses beliefs.
{"title":"Moral language and Moore’s Paradox: Challenging moral expressivism","authors":"Pascale Willemsen, Lucien Baumgartner","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106337","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106337","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Moore’s Paradox—e.g., “It’s raining but I don’t think it’s raining”—is widely considered infelicitous despite being logically consistent. In this paper, we extend Moore’s Paradox to moral discourse and test whether moral statements like “Murder is wrong but I don’t disapprove of it” elicit similar intuitions. Rooted in moral expressivism, the Parity Thesis predicts that moral assertions express non-cognitive attitudes (e.g., approval/disapproval) in a manner analogous to how descriptive statements express beliefs. In a pre-registered study with 1200 participants, we empirically test this thesis using a mixed design that manipulates moral term type (thick vs thin), evaluative polarity (positive vs negative), perspective (first vs third person), and attitude (belief vs disapproval). The results of our main study and one qualitative follow-up study suggest that while moral statements resemble Moorean Paradoxes in important ways, participants find it largely acceptable to call an action wrong without disapproving of it. As the infelicity of such statements is a core ingredient of Moorean Paradoxes and, as we suggest, the Parity Thesis, we conclude that moral language does not express approval and disapproval like declarative language expresses beliefs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106337"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145574809","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-20DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106356
Ágnes Lukács , Bálint József Ugrin , Krisztina Sára Lukics
Language acquisition and processing rely on a dynamic network of cognitive abilities, where various mechanisms interact to support the recognition, integration, and application of linguistic patterns. Previous research has largely focused on the dual relationships between statistical learning and language abilities, or between core cognitive functions (perceptual speed, working memory, cognitive control) and linguistic abilities, leaving their combined interaction underexplored. To address this gap, this study investigates how statistical learning—a process that enables individuals to detect patterns in language—relates to linguistic abilities and the extent to which core cognitive functions contribute to this relationship. We assessed a large sample of 608 Hungarian speakers (ages 14 to 92) on multiple tasks measuring statistical learning (speech segmentation, artificial grammar learning), linguistic performance (grammatical sensitivity, pragmatic comprehension, semantic prediction, violation processing, and reading efficiency), and core cognitive abilities (perceptual speed, working memory, cognitive control). Structural equation modelling revealed significant small to moderate relationships between statistical learning and language abilities, with offline statistical learning tasks predicting linguistic performance better than online measures (which assess statistical learning in real time). Importantly, core cognitive abilities, especially perceptual speed and working memory, consistently mediated the relationship between statistical learning and language processing, revealing the interconnected dynamics between these functions. These results support the notion that while statistical learning contributes to individual differences in language abilities, its effect is partially explained by core cognitive mechanisms implicated in both statistical learning and language processing. The findings highlight the complexity of language acquisition and processing, and underscore the need for further investigation into the mediating role of other cognitive factors.
{"title":"Statistical learning and individual differences in language abilities: A structural equation modelling study on the mediating roles of perceptual speed, working memory, and cognitive control","authors":"Ágnes Lukács , Bálint József Ugrin , Krisztina Sára Lukics","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106356","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106356","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Language acquisition and processing rely on a dynamic network of cognitive abilities, where various mechanisms interact to support the recognition, integration, and application of linguistic patterns. Previous research has largely focused on the dual relationships between statistical learning and language abilities, or between core cognitive functions (perceptual speed, working memory, cognitive control) and linguistic abilities, leaving their combined interaction underexplored. To address this gap, this study investigates how statistical learning—a process that enables individuals to detect patterns in language—relates to linguistic abilities and the extent to which core cognitive functions contribute to this relationship. We assessed a large sample of 608 Hungarian speakers (ages 14 to 92) on multiple tasks measuring statistical learning (speech segmentation, artificial grammar learning), linguistic performance (grammatical sensitivity, pragmatic comprehension, semantic prediction, violation processing, and reading efficiency), and core cognitive abilities (perceptual speed, working memory, cognitive control). Structural equation modelling revealed significant small to moderate relationships between statistical learning and language abilities, with offline statistical learning tasks predicting linguistic performance better than online measures (which assess statistical learning in real time). Importantly, core cognitive abilities, especially perceptual speed and working memory, consistently mediated the relationship between statistical learning and language processing, revealing the interconnected dynamics between these functions. These results support the notion that while statistical learning contributes to individual differences in language abilities, its effect is partially explained by core cognitive mechanisms implicated in both statistical learning and language processing. The findings highlight the complexity of language acquisition and processing, and underscore the need for further investigation into the mediating role of other cognitive factors.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106356"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145574801","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-17DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106375
Ze Hong , Joseph Henrich
Humans often struggle to incorporate chance information into performance evaluations. Across diverse samples in China and the United States (total N = 1387), we show that people systematically misperceive or ignore chance-level success rates when judging the efficacy of technological practices. Using scenarios where chance performance is objectively known (e.g., ∼50 % success rate for fetal sex prediction), we find that (1) many participants underestimate the success achievable by random guessing, (2) even when they accurately recognize chance-level information, they often fail to use it as a baseline for evaluating expert predictions, and (3) this “chance neglect” is especially pronounced in performance-related judgments. These findings highlight a cognitive bias that may contribute to the persistence of ineffective technologies across societies.
{"title":"Chance neglect in performance judgments","authors":"Ze Hong , Joseph Henrich","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106375","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106375","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Humans often struggle to incorporate chance information into performance evaluations. Across diverse samples in China and the United States (total <em>N</em> = 1387), we show that people systematically misperceive or ignore chance-level success rates when judging the efficacy of technological practices. Using scenarios where chance performance is objectively known (e.g., ∼50 % success rate for fetal sex prediction), we find that (1) many participants underestimate the success achievable by random guessing, (2) even when they accurately recognize chance-level information, they often fail to use it as a baseline for evaluating expert predictions, and (3) this “chance neglect” is especially pronounced in performance-related judgments. These findings highlight a cognitive bias that may contribute to the persistence of ineffective technologies across societies.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106375"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145551655","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-14DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106345
Fleur L. Bouwer , Atser Damsma , Thomas M. Kaplan , Mohsen Ghorashi Sarvestani , Marcus T. Pearce
Rhythm, such as in music, contains structure in the form of rhythmic patterns: the more or less predictable successions of longer and shorter intervals (i.e., the “morse code” of the rhythm). Listeners can use rhythmic patterns to predict the timing of sounds and guide their perception and action. It is still unclear how rhythmic patterns are represented in the human mind. Here, we used a probabilistic model of auditory expectations to simulate the perception and production of rhythmic patterns. We modelled expectations in rhythmic sequences at three different levels of abstraction: as the predictability of absolute inter-onset intervals (IOI), ratios between successive intervals (ratio), and the direction of change of successive intervals (contour). Subsequently, we selected rhythms that varied maximally in their modelled predictability across the three levels of abstraction for three behavioral tasks: a target detection task in which the rhythm was not task-relevant (implicit task), a complexity rating task (explicit task), and a tapping task (motor task). We found that both ratio and contour affected behavioral responses across all tasks, with the largest effects in the explicit rating task. IOI only affected responses for the explicit and motor tasks, where the rhythm was task-relevant, and to a greater extent when an imprecise, categorical representation of IOI was assumed. These findings suggest that humans rely mostly on imprecise representations of rhythmic patterns, but may flexibly adapt their representation based on task demands.
{"title":"Abstract representations underlie rhythm perception and production: Evidence from a probabilistic model of temporal structure","authors":"Fleur L. Bouwer , Atser Damsma , Thomas M. Kaplan , Mohsen Ghorashi Sarvestani , Marcus T. Pearce","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106345","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106345","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Rhythm, such as in music, contains structure in the form of rhythmic patterns: the more or less predictable successions of longer and shorter intervals (i.e., the “morse code” of the rhythm). Listeners can use rhythmic patterns to predict the timing of sounds and guide their perception and action. It is still unclear how rhythmic patterns are represented in the human mind. Here, we used a probabilistic model of auditory expectations to simulate the perception and production of rhythmic patterns. We modelled expectations in rhythmic sequences at three different levels of abstraction: as the predictability of absolute inter-onset intervals (IOI), ratios between successive intervals (ratio), and the direction of change of successive intervals (contour). Subsequently, we selected rhythms that varied maximally in their modelled predictability across the three levels of abstraction for three behavioral tasks: a target detection task in which the rhythm was not task-relevant (implicit task), a complexity rating task (explicit task), and a tapping task (motor task). We found that both ratio and contour affected behavioral responses across all tasks, with the largest effects in the explicit rating task. IOI only affected responses for the explicit and motor tasks, where the rhythm was task-relevant, and to a greater extent when an imprecise, categorical representation of IOI was assumed. These findings suggest that humans rely mostly on imprecise representations of rhythmic patterns, but may flexibly adapt their representation based on task demands.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106345"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145529093","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-14DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106350
Berfin Bastug , Vani G. Rajendran , Roberta Bianco , Trevor Agus , Maria Chait , Daniel Pressnitzer
Even though memory plays a pervasive role in perception, the nature of the memory traces left by past sounds is still largely mysterious. Here, we probed the memory for natural auditory textures. For such stochastic sounds, two types of representations have been put forward: a representation based on sets of temporally local features, or a representation based on time-averaged summary statistics. We synthesized naturalistic texture exemplars and used them in an implicit memory paradigm based on repetition, previously shown to induce rapid learning for artificial sounds such as white noise. Results were similar for artificial and natural sounds, exhibiting a general trend for a decrease in repetition detection performance with increasing exemplar duration, although with some variation depending on texture type. This trend could be captured by a summary statistics model, but also by a new model based on the random sampling of temporally local features. Moreover, repeated exposure to a same natural texture or artificial noise exemplar systematically induced a performance gain, which was comparable across all sound types and exemplar durations. Thus, natural texture exemplars were amenable to learning when repeated exposure was available. The findings are consistent with two interpretations: the existence of a special processing mode when acoustic repetition is involved, to which natural textures are not immune, or a convergence of the local features versus summary statistics descriptions if a continuum of time scales is considered for auditory representations.
{"title":"Memory for repeated auditory textures","authors":"Berfin Bastug , Vani G. Rajendran , Roberta Bianco , Trevor Agus , Maria Chait , Daniel Pressnitzer","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106350","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106350","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Even though memory plays a pervasive role in perception, the nature of the memory traces left by past sounds is still largely mysterious. Here, we probed the memory for natural auditory textures. For such stochastic sounds, two types of representations have been put forward: a representation based on sets of temporally local features, or a representation based on time-averaged summary statistics. We synthesized naturalistic texture exemplars and used them in an implicit memory paradigm based on repetition, previously shown to induce rapid learning for artificial sounds such as white noise. Results were similar for artificial and natural sounds, exhibiting a general trend for a decrease in repetition detection performance with increasing exemplar duration, although with some variation depending on texture type. This trend could be captured by a summary statistics model, but also by a new model based on the random sampling of temporally local features. Moreover, repeated exposure to a same natural texture or artificial noise exemplar systematically induced a performance gain, which was comparable across all sound types and exemplar durations. Thus, natural texture exemplars were amenable to learning when repeated exposure was available. The findings are consistent with two interpretations: the existence of a special processing mode when acoustic repetition is involved, to which natural textures are not immune, or a convergence of the local features versus summary statistics descriptions if a continuum of time scales is considered for auditory representations.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106350"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145529094","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
For billions of bilinguals, many communicative acts involve a choice between languages. Here, we evaluate the theory that bilinguals choose a language to regulate their emotional reactions. We present four experiments demonstrating that language choice could be guided by anticipated emotional impact. Across several languages (Chinese, English, and Spanish), 1083 bilinguals from China, the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Spain preferred a foreign language to speak about embarrassing topics, and this preference was associated with expecting fewer serious emotional and interpersonal consequences. Language preference was a function of native-ness rather than its associated culture, as the effect was evident even when languages were crossed (English native/Spanish foreign, Spanish native/English foreign). Foreign language use increases emotional distance, and bilinguals prefer using a foreign language over a native language to avoid feeling the embarrassment of discussing aversive topics. Hence, language choice could be an emotional regulation tool for bilinguals.
{"title":"Embarrassment guides language choice","authors":"Becky K.Y. Lau , Veronica Vazquez-Olivieri , Claire Guang , Boaz Keysar","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106355","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106355","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>For billions of bilinguals, many communicative acts involve a choice between languages. Here, we evaluate the theory that bilinguals choose a language to regulate their emotional reactions. We present four experiments demonstrating that language choice could be guided by anticipated emotional impact. Across several languages (Chinese, English, and Spanish), 1083 bilinguals from China, the United States, Canada, Mexico, and Spain preferred a foreign language to speak about embarrassing topics, and this preference was associated with expecting fewer serious emotional and interpersonal consequences. Language preference was a function of native-ness rather than its associated culture, as the effect was evident even when languages were crossed (English native/Spanish foreign, Spanish native/English foreign). Foreign language use increases emotional distance, and bilinguals prefer using a foreign language over a native language to avoid feeling the embarrassment of discussing aversive topics. Hence, language choice could be an emotional regulation tool for bilinguals.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106355"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145514599","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-11DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106352
Laurel Perkins, Tim Hunter
Language acquisition involves drawing systematic generalizations from messy data. On one hypothesis, this is facilitated by a domain-general bias for children to “regularize” their input, sharpening the statistical distributions in their input towards more systematic extremes. We introduce a general computational framework for modeling a different explanation: on this view, children expect that their data are a noisy realization of a restrictive underlying grammatical system. We implement a learner that evaluates a choice among composite context-free grammars, in which a restricted set of “core” rules, comprising the particular grammatical processes that the learner is currently trying to acquire, operate alongside a less restricted set of “noise” rules, representing other independent processes that have yet to be learned, and conspire to introduce distortions into the data. Our Noisy Grammar Learner partitions its data into portions that serve as evidence for one of the possible core grammars in its hypothesis space, and portions generated by these noise processes. It does so without knowing in advance how much noise occurs or what its properties are. We compare our learner to a common implementation of the general regularization bias approach, and show that both can account for children’s behavior in a representative artificial language learning experiment. However, we find that only our approach succeeds on two naturalistic case studies in early syntax acquisition: learning the rules governing canonical word-order and case-marking, given natural language data with “noise” from non-canonical sentence types. We show that our learner succeeds because its architecture allows a natural way to express linguistically-motivated expectations about the character of those rules. This suggests that, in certain domains, successful learning from messy data may be enabled by a hypothesis space comprising restrictive grammatical options.
{"title":"Modeling regularization in language acquisition as noise-tolerant grammar selection","authors":"Laurel Perkins, Tim Hunter","doi":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106352","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106352","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Language acquisition involves drawing systematic generalizations from messy data. On one hypothesis, this is facilitated by a domain-general bias for children to “regularize” their input, sharpening the statistical distributions in their input towards more systematic extremes. We introduce a general computational framework for modeling a different explanation: on this view, children expect that their data are a noisy realization of a restrictive underlying grammatical system. We implement a learner that evaluates a choice among composite context-free grammars, in which a restricted set of “core” rules, comprising the particular grammatical processes that the learner is currently trying to acquire, operate alongside a less restricted set of “noise” rules, representing other independent processes that have yet to be learned, and conspire to introduce distortions into the data. Our <em>Noisy Grammar Learner</em> partitions its data into portions that serve as evidence for one of the possible core grammars in its hypothesis space, and portions generated by these noise processes. It does so without knowing in advance how much noise occurs or what its properties are. We compare our learner to a common implementation of the general regularization bias approach, and show that both can account for children’s behavior in a representative artificial language learning experiment. However, we find that only our approach succeeds on two naturalistic case studies in early syntax acquisition: learning the rules governing canonical word-order and case-marking, given natural language data with “noise” from non-canonical sentence types. We show that our learner succeeds because its architecture allows a natural way to express linguistically-motivated expectations about the character of those rules. This suggests that, in certain domains, successful learning from messy data may be enabled by a hypothesis space comprising restrictive grammatical options.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48455,"journal":{"name":"Cognition","volume":"268 ","pages":"Article 106352"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145479069","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"心理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2025-11-11DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106373
Olaf Borghi , Ben M. Tappin , Kaat Smets , Manos Tsakiris
People often favour information aligned with their ideological motives. Can our tendency for directional motivated reasoning be overcome with cognitive control? It remains contested whether cognitive control processes, such as cognitive reflection and inhibitory control, are linked to a greater tendency to engage in politically motivated reasoning, as proposed by the “motivated reflection” hypothesis, or can help people overcome it, as suggested by cognitive science research. In this pre-registered study (N = 504 UK participants rating n = 4963 news messages), we first provide evidence for motivated reasoning on multiple political and non-political topics. We then investigated the associations of the two cognitive control variables cognitive reflection and inhibitory control with motivated reasoning. We find that associations between cognitive control processes and motivated reasoning are likely small. On political topics specifically, we find that a negative association with cognitive reflection is more likely than a positive association. This finding is contrary to predictions from the popular motivated reflection hypothesis. Results for inhibitory control are inconclusive. We discuss how these findings relate to interdisciplinary literature from cognitive and political psychology.
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