Mental representation and hypothetico-deductive reasoning: The case of the THOG problem

Abstract

This article reports three experiments that deal with the source of the difficulty of Wason's (1977) THOG problem. The solution of this problem demands both the postulation of hypotheses and a combinatorial analysis of their consequences. Experiment 1 showed that the generation of the hypotheses is not in itself sufficient to solve the problem. Experiment 2 showed that a version presenting a plausible context for separating the level of data from that of hypotheses produced a better performance than both the original abstract version and a thematic version lacking the plausible context separating the levels. Experiment 3 gave evidence that this context can produce facilitation even with the geometric material of the classic version. This experiment also showed that a pictorial presentation of data and a verbal presentation of hypotheses affect performance negatively. The results demonstrate the role of problem representation in problem solving, and, in particular, the role of homogeneity in representing data and hypotheses in hypothetico-deductive reasoning.