School of Health Sciences, Neapolis University Pafos, Pafos 8042, Cyprus.
J Exp Psychol Learn Mem Cogn. 2013 May;39(3):854-65. doi: 10.1037/a0029468. Epub 2012 Jul 30.
The present set of 7 experiments systematically examined the effectiveness of adding causal explanations to simple refutations in reducing or eliminating the impact of outdated information on subsequent comprehension. The addition of a single causal-explanation sentence to a refutation was sufficient to eliminate any measurable disruption in comprehension caused by the outdated information (Experiment 1) but was not sufficient to eliminate its reactivation (Experiment 2). However, a 3 sentence causal-explanation addition to a refutation eliminated both any measurable disruption in comprehension (Experiment 3) and the reactivation of the outdated information (Experiment 4). A direct comparison between the 1 and 3 causal-explanation conditions provided converging evidence for these findings (Experiment 5). Furthermore, a comparison of the 3 sentence causal-explanation condition with a 3 sentence qualified-elaboration condition demonstrated that even though both conditions were sufficient to eliminate any measurable disruption in comprehension (Experiment 6), only the causal-explanation condition was sufficient to eliminate the reactivation of the outdated information (Experiment 7). These results establish a boundary condition under which outdated information will influence comprehension; they also have broader implications for both the updating process and knowledge revision in general.
本系列的 7 个实验系统地检验了在简单反驳中添加因果解释以减少或消除过时信息对后续理解的影响的有效性。在反驳中添加一个简单的因果解释句子足以消除过时信息引起的任何可测量的理解障碍（实验 1），但不足以消除其重新激活（实验 2）。然而，在反驳中添加三句因果解释足以消除理解上的任何可测量障碍（实验 3）和过时信息的重新激活（实验 4）。反驳中的 1 个和 3 个因果解释条件之间的直接比较为这些发现提供了确凿的证据（实验 5）。此外，将三句因果解释条件与三句限定阐述条件进行比较表明，尽管这两种条件都足以消除理解上的任何可测量障碍（实验 6），但只有因果解释条件足以消除过时信息的重新激活（实验 7）。这些结果确定了一个过时信息将影响理解的边界条件；它们还对更新过程和一般知识修订具有更广泛的意义。
