Feature importance in feature generation and typicality rating

Abstract

Studies on feature importance in category membership judgements have shown that perceptual features are more important than functional features in category membership decisions of natural kind concepts, whereas functional features are more important than perceptual features in category membership decisions of artefact concepts. The present paper addresses the question whether this interaction between kind of feature and kind of concept can also be found for other category-based decision tasks. The first study investigated feature importance in feature generation tasks. The second study focused on feature importance in typicality rating tasks. Both studies show that perceptual features are more important than functional features for natural kind objects and that functional features are more important than perceptual features for artefact objects. This suggests that the interaction between kind of feature and kind of concept as observed in category membership decisions can be generalised to other category-based decision tasks.