Dimensions of Judgment: Factor Analysis of Individual Differences

Abstract

ABSTRACTIn this paper, we explore a pattern of individual differences in performance on judgment tasks. One hundred participants completed a battery of standard judgment tasks, including multiple cue judgment and tasks based on the “heuristics and biases” and problem‐solving literature. Participants also completed tests of fluid and crystallized intelligence, forward digit span memory, and multiple cue probability learning. Confirmatory factor analyses indicated a two‐factor structure underlying performance on these tasks and tests. The two moderately correlated factors reflected a distinction between tasks requiring accurate judgments based on multiple cues (correspondence tasks) and those requiring coherent judgments (coherence tasks), in which probabilities are compared and combined. Measures of fluid and crystallized intelligence and forward digit span memory were correlated with both factors but were more associated with correspondence than with coherence. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.