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Lab-based research on insight has typically explored solutions on specially designed puzzles, but there is growing interest in exploring insight in more naturalistic contexts. Anecdotally computer programmers report experiences that sound similar to common insight phenomena such as Aha! and restructuring . To better understand moments of insight in computer programming, we conducted a protocol study where we asked intermediate-level computer-programming students to think-aloud as they solved three problems that required non-obvious solutions. Participants began their solutions on a whiteboard and then implemented their solutions in C++. This yielded several data sources including the trace data and the quality of their programmed solutions. This data was used to test whether and when programmers experienced Aha! or restructuring while solving these problems. This data was also used to test whether common findings in insight problem solving research such as the Aha-Accuracy effect and the theorized impasse-insight sequence are present when computer programming.


CogSci 2023

Exploring Restructuring and Aha! in the Context of Computer Programming

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The 45th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society will take place in Sydney, Australia as a modified hybrid conference. Presentations from the main-session room will be live-streamed every day for all events. This will include all invited talks and award sessions. Recordings of all CogSci 2023 sessions will be made available for on-demand viewing after the conference.<br>
The in-person component will be held at the International Convention Centre Sydney at Darling Harbour. The Conference will take place Wednesday July 26th – Saturday July 29th, 2023 (Wednesday, July 26th is the Workshops Day).

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The 45th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society presents the latest research across cognitive science and highlights the theme of Cognition in Context.

The purpose of this study is to examine how young adults use their metacognitive abilities such as cognitive strategies and self-checking during the mathematics problem-solving process. The study group consisted of 12 young adults selected from three different faculties. A multimodal mixed-methods design was employed, where participants were asked to think out loud while solving ten mathematical problems. The experimental process was recorded with the use of eye-tracking, which was utilized to evaluate the active use of metacognitive sub-skills. The findings from the experimental process revealed that there is a significant difference between the amount of reflection of young adults’ and pupils' cognitive strategy and self-checking skill levels on their responses to mathematics problem solving process in favor of young students.

Differential Effect of Young Adults’ and Students’ MetaCognitive Skills in Mathematics Problem Solving Process

Collaborative problem solving capability (CPS) has become more important recently. Accurate measurement of CPS is necessary for developing training programs. However, most existing CPS measurement tools have two weaknesses. They do not account for individual contributions to the output. Also, it is hard to utilize new problems. Addressing these weaknesses, we modified the PISA 2015 framework to account for individual contributions to the output and introduced peer-assessment. To test the validity of our proposition, we had fifty participants perform two tasks in different groups, and analyzed the results. We found that the score from PISA 2015 and our modified score showed a high correlation. And, peer-assessed modified scores approximated expert-assessed modified scores. Furthermore, peer-assessed modified scores between the tasks showed a significant correlation, suggesting that it is consistent across different tasks and groups. These results suggest that the modified method and adopting peer-assessment can be used to measure CPS.

Measuring Collaborative Problem Solving Capability Using Peer Assessment

Recent work has suggested that caregivers adjust their speech to their child's individual lexical knowledge when playing a reference game. Whether caregivers display similar scaffolding during shared reading interactions remains unexplored. We hypothesized that similar adjustments may characterize caregivers’ communication during shared reading interactions and support children’s word learning. Caregivers and their 4- and 5-year-olds engaged in shared reading with two custom storybooks with embedded low-frequency words. Immediately before the session, caregivers were asked whether their child understood or produced those words via a vocabulary checklist. The shared reading interactions were video-recorded and transcribed. Caregivers’ communication was coded offline for repetitions, questions, comments, and gestures in relation to target words. Children’s word learning outcomes were measured after the shared reading episodes. Results will clarify whether and how caregivers adjust their communication to their perceived child's individual lexical knowledge, and whether this adjustment enhances word learning in naturalistic settings.

Do caregivers’ communicative adjustments enhance 4- and 5-year-olds' word learning? Testing the generalizability of the fine-tuning hypothesis to naturalistic shared reading interactions

This study investigated the effect of interleaving and epistemological beliefs on the reading comprehension of multiple conflicting documents. Especially, it is assumed that interleaving may highlight the differences through discrimination and contrast, thus improving the integration of source and content information. A one-factor experiment was conducted (n = 179) to examine the effect of interleaving and spacing on reading comprehension. In addition, a parallel chain mediation model was established based on the Documents Model Framework. Path analysis results indicated an interleaving effect which took place through germane cognitive load and viewpoint description, while spacing enhanced source memory and source-content links. Furthermore, justification for knowing moderated the effect of interleaving on germane cognitive load. Participants with high level of justification reported the lowest germane cognitive load in the interleaved condition. Potential mechanism of interleaving in multiple document reading was discussed.

Integrating in Interleaved Conflicting Documents: Content Preference and Epistemic Beliefs Matter

Popular culture consists of elements consumed by the general public, such as movies, television shows, and books, that reflect the attitudes, practices, beliefs, and cultural objects prevalent in society. Popular culture tends to influence numerous facets of one’s lifestyle, and both empirical and anecdotal evidence suggests that it plays a role in determining the career of nascent professionals. We conducted an anonymized survey to assess the effect of popular culture on pursuing a career in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine (STEMM). Results from the path analysis identified the direct effect of different aspects of popular media on the perceptions of social standing in choosing a STEMM career.

Exploring the relationship between popular culture and perceptions of social standing in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medicine (STEMM) careers: a pilot study using path analysis

In 2021, charitable giving accounted for about 2.1% of the national gross domestic product in the U.S., with 67% of donations coming from individual donors. Despite the profound impact of this industry on the economy, with respect to its provision of services and goods as well as employment opportunities and wages, much is still unknown about the psychological processes supporting charitable giving. One major theoretical distinction emerging in the literature is that between acts of charity motivated by a consideration of the needs of recipients vs. those prompted by the needs of the giver. Here, we investigated how socio-affective constructs of “simulated vs. genuine compassion” impact the inclination to make public vs. anonymous charitable donations and assessed how information about social norms influences those differences.

Socio-Affective Traits Mediating Charitable Giving

Recent empirical work has shown that human children are adept at learning and reasoning with probabilities. Here, we model a series of recent experiments investigating the development of school-age children's non-symbolic probability reasoning ability using the Neural Probability Learner and Sampler (NPLS) system. We demonstrate that NPLS can accurately simulate the probability judgments and a temporary interference from incorrectly using pure numerical frequencies in probabilistic tasks in children. We discuss the roles of model parameters in simulating probability matching in children, and their occasional tendency to wrongly select less probable outcomes based on frequencies.

A Computational Model of Children's Learning and Use of Probabilities

Whether children revise their beliefs depends on the counter-evidence they are given. Research with German-speaking children showed that 5-year-olds but not 3-year-olds were more likely to revise their beliefs when presented with direct rather indirect evidence for a claim contradicting their beliefs (Köymen & Tomasello, 2018). Unlike German or English, in languages like Turkish, the obligatory use of evidential markers provides information about reliability, whether the speaker refers to direct or indirect observation. This online study investigated whether Turkish- and English-speaking 3- and 5-year-olds (N=146) revised their initial plausible beliefs in favor of implausible beliefs supported by various types of counter-evidence (direct, indirect, or inference). The results showed that 3-year-olds not only revised their beliefs more often than 5-year-olds, but they also did so more in the direct and inference conditions compared to the indirect condition. Thus, three-year-olds can consider the evidentiary strength of counterarguments when revising their beliefs.

Turkish- and English- speaking children's belief revision based on their evaluation of counterarguments

Most of what we know about the development of generalization comes from studies on children’s reasoning from positive evidence (e.g., evidence of other birds with hollow bones). The present study examined the significance of negative evidence (e.g., evidence of animals that do not have hollow bones). Three-, 4-, and 5-year-olds (N=98) were asked to generalize from samples with negative evidence and samples with positive evidence that were selected either deliberately or incidentally. All children made a higher rate of generalizations from samples that included negative evidence than samples that included positive evidence, but only when evidence was selected deliberately by the experimenter. Furthermore, 5-year-olds generalized from samples in which negative evidence presented either an explicit contrast with the category in question (e.g., sheep do not have hollow bones) or an implicit contrast with the category in question (e.g., sheep have dense bones). Three- and four-year-olds generalized only when samples presented explicit contrasts. These results are discussed in light of other work on inductive reasoning that emphasizes the role of dyadic factors on generalization, such as the expectation that informants intend to share relevant information.

Accentuate the negative: Expectations about sampling procedures determine the impact of negative evidence on children’s inductive judgments

We investigate the early emergence of children’s information-search competence using a simplified version of Lindow’s (2021) finding-presents game. Children (n = 86, 30- to 48-months old) had to find a present in one of three closed boxes. All boxes were identical but for one feature (e.g., all boxes were blue and had a flower icon, but one box was round, one heart-shaped, and one squared). Children received three information cards revealing one feature of the target box (i.e., its color, shape, or icon). As the boxes differed in only one feature, only one information card contained the relevant information to the decision. Children could flip one information card to learn about one particular feature before deciding which box to open. We find that children as young as 2.5 years can efficiently search for information to guide their decisions and underline the importance of using age-appropriate paradigms.


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Exploring Restructuring and Aha! in the Context of Computer Programming

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Differential Effect of Young Adults’ and Students’ MetaCognitive Skills in Mathematics Problem Solving Process

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