Abstract
Causal induction provides a nice test domain for examining the influence of individual-difference factors on cognition. The phenomena of both conditionalization and discounting reflect attention to multiple potential causes when people infer what caused an effect. We explored the hypothesis that individuals with an independent self-construal are relatively less sensitive to context (other causes) than are individuals with an interdependent self-construal in this domain. We found greater levels of conditionalization and data consistent with discounting for participants in whom we primed an interdependent self-construal than for participants in whom we primed an independent self-construal.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.
References
Busemeyer, J. R., Myung, I. J., &McDaniel, M. A. (1993). Cue competition effects: Empirical tests of adaptive network learning models.Psychological Science,4, 190–195.
Cheng, P. W. (1993). Separating causal laws from causal facts: Pressing the limits of statistical relevance. In D. L. Medin (Ed.),The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 30, pp. 215–264). New York: Academic Press.
Choi, I., Nisbett, R. E., &Norenzayan, A. (1999). Causal attribution across cultures: Variation and universality.Psychological Bulletin,125, 47–63.
Constantine, M. G. (2001). Independent and interdependent self-construals as predictors of multicultural case conceptualization ability in counsellor trainees.Counselling Psychology Quarterly,14, 33–42.
Cross, S. E., &Madson, L. (1997). Models of the self: Self-construals and gender.Psychological Bulletin,122, 5–37.
Gardner, W. L., Gabriel, S., &Lee, A. Y. (1999). “I” value freedom, but “we” value relationships: Self-construal priming mirrors cultural differences in judgment.Psychological Science,10, 321–326.
Goedert, K. M., Harsch, J., &Spellman, B. A. (2005). Discounting and conditionalization: Dissociable cognitive processes in human causal inference.Psychological Science,16, 590–595.
Goedert, K. M., &Spellman, B. A. (2005). Nonnormative discounting: There is more to cue interaction effects than controlling for alternative causes.Learning & Behavior,33, 197–210.
Haberstroh, S., Oyserman, D., Schwarz, N., Kuhnen, U., &Ji, L. J. (2002). Is the interdependent self more sensitive to question context than the independent self? Self-construal and the observation of conversational norms.Journal of Experimental Social Psychology,38, 323–329.
Hong, Y. Y., &Chiu, C. Y. (2001). Toward a paradigm shift: From crosscultural differences in social cognition to social-cognitive mediation of cultural differences.Social Cognition,19, 181–196.
Ji, L. J., Peng, K. P., &Nisbett, R. E. (2000). Culture, control, and perception of relationships in the environment.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,78, 943–955.
Ji, L. J., Zhang, Z. Y., &Nisbett, R. E. (2004). Is it culture or is it language? Examination of language effects in cross-cultural research on categorization.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,87, 57–65.
Kim, K., &Markman, A. B. (2006). Differences in fear of isolation as an explanation of cultural differences: Evidence from memory and reasoning.Journal of Experimental Social Psychology,42, 350–364.
Kuhn, M. H., &McPartland, T. (1954). An empirical investigation of self-attitudes.American Sociological Review,19, 69–76.
Kuhnen, U., Hannover, B., &Schubert, B. (2001). The semanticprocedural interface model of the self: The role of self-knowledge for context-dependent versus context-independent modes of thinking.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,80, 397–409.
Kuhnen, U., &Oyserman, D. (2002). Thinking about the self influences thinking in general: Cognitive consequences of salient selfconcept.Journal of Experimental Social Psychology,38, 492–499.
Lopez, A., Atran, S., Coley, J. D., Medin, D. L., &Smith, E. E. (1997). The tree of life: Universal and cultural features of folkbiological taxonomies and inductions.Cognitive Psychology,32, 251–295.
Maddox, W. T., Baldwin, G. C., &Markman, A. B. (2006). A test of the regulatory fit hypothesis in perceptual classification learning.Memory & Cognition,34, 1377–1397.
Markman, A. B. (1989). LMS rules and the inverse base-rate effect: Comment on Gluck and Bower (1988).Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,118, 417–421.
Markman, A. B., Baldwin, G. C., &Maddox, W. T. (2005). The interaction of payoff structure and regulatory focus in classification.Psychological Science,16, 852–855.
Markus, H. R., &Kitayama, S. (1991). Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation.Psychological Review,98, 224–253.
Masuda, T., &Nisbett, R. E. (2001). Attending holistically versus analytically: Comparing the context sensitivity of Japanese and Americans.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,81, 922–934.
Melz, E. R., Cheng, P. W., Holyoak, K. J., &Waldmann, M. R. (1993). Cue competition in human categorization: Contingency or the Rescorla-Wagner learning rule. Comment.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,19, 1398–1410.
Peng, K. P., &Nisbett, R. E. (1999). Culture, dialectics, and reasoning about contradiction.American Psychologist,54, 741–754.
Price, P. C., &Yates, J. F. (1993). Judgmental overshadowing: Further evidence of cue interaction in contingency judgment.Memory & Cognition,21, 561–572.
Proffitt, J. B., Coley, J. D., &Medin, D. L. (2000). Expertise and category-based induction.Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, & Cognition,26, 811–828.
Rescorla, R. A., &Wagner, A. R. (1972). A theory of Pavlovian conditioning: Variations in the effectiveness of reinforcement and nonreinforcement. In A. H. Black & W. F. Prokasy (Eds.),Classical conditioning II: Current research and theory (pp. 64–69). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
Sobel, M. E. (1982). Asymptotic intervals for indirect effects in structural equations models. In S. Leinhart (Ed.),Sociological methodology (pp. 290–312). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Spellman, B. A. (1996a). Acting as intuitive scientists: Contingency judgments are made while controlling for alternative potential causes.Psychological Science,7, 337–342.
Spellman, B. A. (1996b). Conditionalizing causality. In D. L. Medin (Ed.),The psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 34, pp. 167–206). San Diego: Academic Press.
Spellman, B. A., Price, C. M., &Logan, J. M. (2001). How two causes are different from one: The use of (un)conditional information in Simpson’s paradox.Memory & Cognition,29, 193–208.
Tangen, J. M., &Allan, L. G. (2003). The relative effect of cue interaction.Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology,56B, 279–300.
Trafimow, D., Triandis, H. C., &Goto, S. G. (1991). Some tests of the distinction between the private self and the collective self.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,60, 649–655.
van Baaren, R. B., Maddux, W. W., Chartrand, T. L., de Bouter, C., &van Knippenberg, A. (2003). It takes two to mimic: Behavioral consequences of self-construals.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,84, 1093–1102.
Van Hamme, L. J., &Wasseerman, E. A. (1994). Cue competition in causality judgments: The role of nonpresentation of compound stimulus elements.Learning & Motivation,25, 127–151.
Wasserman, E. A., Chatlosh, D. L., &Neunaber, D. J. (1983). Perception of causal relations in humans: Factors affecting judgments of response outcome contingencies under free-operant procedures.Learning & Motivation,14, 406–432.
Watson, D., Clark, L. A., &Tellegen, A. (1988). Development and validation of brief measures of positive and negative affect: The PANAS scales.Journal of Personality & Social Psychology,54, 1063–1070.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
This research was supported by NIDA Grant NIH 1 R21 DA015211-01A1 to the third author.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kim, K., Grimm, L.R. & Markman, A.B. Self-construal and the processing of covariation information in causal reasoning. Memory & Cognition 35, 1337–1343 (2007). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03193605
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03193605