Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Table of Contents - October 2011 - Volume 34, Issue 05  

Open Peer Commentary

Norms and high-level cognition: Consequences, trends, and antidotes

Simon McNaira1 and Aidan Feeneya1

a1 School of Psychology, Queen's University Belfast, University Road, Belfast BT7 1NN, United Kingdom. a.feeney@qub.ac.uk smcnair01@qub.ac.uk http://www.psych.qub.ac.uk/Staff/Profiles/feeney/index.aspx

Abstract

We are neither as pessimistic nor as optimistic as Elqayam & Evans (E&E). The consequences of normativism have not been uniformly disastrous, even among the examples they consider. However, normativism won't be going away any time soon and in the literature on causal Bayes nets new debates about normativism are emerging. Finally, we suggest that to concentrate on expert reasoners as an antidote to normativism may limit the contribution of research on thinking to basic psychological science.

(Online publication October 14 2011)

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