Set-shifting and inhibition interplay affect the rule-matching bias occurrence during conditional reasoning task

Abstract

The rule-matching bias is a common error during conditional reasoning tasks, which refers to a tendency to match responses with the lexical context in the conditional rule and leads to incorrect responses. Conditional reasoning is one of the higher-level cognitive abilities affected by many cognitive skills. We aimed to determine whether inhibition and set-shifting skills with rule-matching bias occurrence could be related and, if so, to what quantitative, at a statistically significant level. A total of 30 healthy university students aged 18 to 30 participated in this study. We used the Wason's Selection Task (WST) to measure conditional reasoning and investigated their inhibition and set-shifting skills with the Stroop and Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, respectively. Results showed a significant positive correlation between the number of correct responses to the Stroop test and the Wason Selection Card Test (p=0.614). There was a positive correlation between the number of correct responses to the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the Wason Selection Card Test (p=0.423). Participants with higher inhibition and set-shifting abilities showed better performance in the conditional reasoning test and lower rule-matching bias errors.

Keywords: conditional reasoning; inhibition; rule-matching bias; set-shifting.