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Rationality, Pragmatics, and Sources ORBIT-OnlineRepository ofBirkbeckInstitutionalTheses Enabling Open Access to Birkbeck’s Research Degree output Rationality, pragmatics, and sources https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/40284/ Version: Full Version Citation: Collins, Peter J. (2017) Rationality, pragmatics, and sources. [Thesis] (Unpublished) c 2020 The Author(s) All material available through ORBIT is protected by intellectual property law, including copy- right law. Any use made of the contents should comply with the relevant law. Deposit Guide Contact: email RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES Rationality, Pragmatics, and Sources Peter J. Collins PhD Thesis Psychological Sciences Birkbeck, University of London 1 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES This thesis is my own work. All collaborative aspects are appropriately indicated at the relevant points. 2 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES Abstract This thesis contributes to the Great Rationality Debate in cognitive science. It introduces and explores a triangular scheme for understanding the relationship between rationality and two key abilities: pragmatics – roughly, inferring implicit intended utterance meanings – and learning from sources. The thesis argues that these three components – rationality, pragmatics, and sources – should be considered together: that each one informs the others. The thesis makes this case through literature review and theoretical work (principally, in Chapters 1 and 8) and through a series of empirical chapters focusing on different parts of the triangular scheme. Chapters 2 to 4 address the relationship between pragmatics and sources, focusing on how people change their beliefs when they read a conditional with a partially reliable source. The data bear on theories of the conditional and on the literature assessing people’s rationality with conditionals. Chapter 5 addresses the relationship between rationality and pragmatics, focusing on conditionals ‘in action’ in a framing effect known as goal framing. The data suggest a complex relationship between pragmatics and utilities, and support a new approach to goal framing. Chapter 6 addresses the relationship between rationality and sources, using normative Bayesian models to explore how people respond to simple claims from sources of different reliabilities. The data support a two-way relationship between claims and source information and, perhaps most strikingly, suggest that people readily treat sources as ‘anti-reliable’: as negatively correlated with the truth. Chapter 7 extends these experiments to test the theory that speakers can guard against reputational damage using hedging. The data do not support this theory, and raise questions about whether trust and vigilance against deception are prerequisites for pragmatics. Lastly, Chapter 8 synthesizes the results; argues for new ways of understanding the relationships between rationality, 3 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES pragmatics, and sources; and relates the findings to emerging formal methods in psychology. 4 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES Table of Contents Table of Contents ........................................................................................... 5 List of Figures .............................................................................................. 11 List of Tables ................................................................................................ 16 Acknowledgements ...................................................................................... 19 1 Theory Chapter ....................................................................................... 20 1.1 The Rationality Debate ..................................................................... 22 1.1.1 Psychological Positions on Rationality. ..................................... 23 1.1.2 Detecting (Ir-)rationality in Experiments ................................... 34 1.2 Pragmatics and Rationality ............................................................... 37 1.2.1 Defining Pragmatics ................................................................... 37 1.2.2 Pragmatics and Theories of Rationality ..................................... 45 1.2.3 Pragmatics and Experiments on Rationality .............................. 47 1.3 Sources .............................................................................................. 64 1.4 Prospectus ......................................................................................... 72 2 Conditionals and Testimony .................................................................. 74 2.1.1 Conditionals in the psychology of reasoning ............................. 76 2.1.2 Conditionals in Psycholinguistics .............................................. 82 2.1.3 Conditionals and Pragmatics ...................................................... 82 2.1.4 Testimony ................................................................................... 86 2.1.5 Towards an experimental method .............................................. 87 2.2 Experiment 2.1: effect of assertion ................................................... 90 2.2.1 Methods ...................................................................................... 90 2.2.2 Results & Discussion ................................................................. 93 2.3 Experiment 2.2: replicating the effect of Assertion .......................... 97 5 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES 2.3.1 Method ....................................................................................... 97 2.3.2 Results & Discussion ................................................................. 99 2.4 Experiment 2.3: effect of source expertise ...................................... 104 2.4.1 Method ..................................................................................... 104 2.4.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 106 2.5 Experiment 2.4: replicating the effect of source expertise .............. 109 2.5.1 Method ..................................................................................... 109 2.5.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 110 2.6 General Discussion .......................................................................... 114 3 Conditionals, Testimony, and Interval Estimates ................................ 120 3.1 Experiment 3.1: Assertion and Interval Estimates .......................... 120 3.1.1 Method ..................................................................................... 120 3.1.2 Results and Discussion ............................................................. 123 3.2 Experiment 3.2: Expertise and Interval Estimates .......................... 130 3.2.1 Method ..................................................................................... 130 3.2.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 130 3.3 General Discussion .......................................................................... 137 4 Independent Testimony, Priors, and a Model of Testimonial Conditionals ........................................................................................................ 140 4.1.1 Multiple Testimony .................................................................. 140 4.1.2 Priors ........................................................................................ 142 4.2 Experiment 4.1: Independent testimony ......................................... 144 4.2.1 Method. .................................................................................... 144 4.2.2 Results ...................................................................................... 145 4.2.3 Discussion ................................................................................ 146 6 RATIONALITY, PRAGMATICS, AND SOURCES 4.3 Experiment 4.2: Priors, Assertion, and the probability of the antecedent ............................................................................................. 149 4.3.1 Methods .................................................................................... 149 4.3.2 Results & Discussion. .............................................................. 151 4.4 Experiment 4.3: Priors, Expertise, and the probability of the antecedent ............................................................................................. 154 4.4.1 Method ..................................................................................... 154 4.4.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 154 4.5 Experiment 4.4: Priors, Assertion, and the probability of the consequent ............................................................................................ 157 4.5.1 Methods .................................................................................... 157 4.5.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 158 4.6 Experiment 4.5: Priors, Expertise, and the probability of the consequent ............................................................................................ 160 4.6.1 Methods .................................................................................... 160 4.6.2 Results & Discussion ............................................................... 161 4.7 General Discussion .......................................................................... 163 4.7.1 Modelling testimonial conditionals .......................................... 166 4.7.2 Probabilities
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