LINKING SYNTAX AND INDUCTIVE REASONING: CATEGORICAL LABELING AND GENERIC NOUN PHRASES

Abstract

When a person is characterized categorically with a noun label (e.g., Linda is a feminist), people tend to think that the attributes associated with that person are central and long-lasting (i.e., labeling effect). This bias, which is related to category-based induction and social misattributions such as stereotyping, has been known to occur because we associate the person with prototypical attributes represented in the category. One experiment described in this article indicates that the labeling effect can occur separately from the attributes represented in the category. The experiment suggests that labeling bolsters not only the perception of prototypical attributes but also the awareness of unrelated or even irrelevant attributes. The results from the experiments suggest that some generic information inherent in noun labels play a crucial role in category-based reasoning.