Talk:Wason selection task

Cheater module
I'm curious if there were any studies trying to frame the abstract questions in "cheater" terms, and if there was an improvement in finding the correct solution then. E.g., the question would be: Even cards are not allowed to have the red color on the reverse side. Which cards must you flip to test the rule? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.226.218.156 (talk) 17:15, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I've heard of such studies, and think it was Tooby and Cosmides who introduced this variation of the experiment. It definitely deserves a mention in the article. Have you tried a Google Scholar search or similar? MartinPoulter (talk) 11:19, 5 October 2013 (UTC) There's already a big section on this in the article! MartinPoulter (talk) 11:22, 5 October 2013 (UTC)

What is the common (even if incorrect) response?
The article seems to imply that many people get this wrong, but doesn't actually tell in exactly which way they do so. That'd be a pretty essential part of the article. Rodrigo de Salvo Braz (talk) 16:56, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree. The solution section even seems to assume that its reader got it wrong. —Bromskloss (talk) 21:57, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I got it right, but I assumed they were only asking for one of the cards. There is more than one card that you could turn over to test the truth of the proposition, but you needn't turn over all of them. I think that's a flaw in the question more than the people answering it.208.90.102.250 (talk) 21:16, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Social context aspect - Autism effect?
I notice the statement: "The suggested rule is that a Wason task proves to be easier if the rule to be tested is one of social exchange (in order to receive benefit X you need to fulfill condition Y) and the subject is asked to police the rule, but is more difficult otherwise."

This immediately led me to wonder if anyone has looked at the results of the Wason task amongst autistic people with normal intelligence. If the hypothesis described above is correct, I would expect that autistic people will give the correct answer to social and non-social versions of the test (drinkers vs age, cards and colours) equally often, unlike "ordinary" people. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.63.58.240 (talk) 13:56, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Good/Evil, Good/Bad philosophies failure?
I think what one learns from this is that not all things in life come in black and white, opposites. If something means something, it doesn't necessarily mean that the opposite of that something means the opposite of the other somethling. neat.

It is therefore logical to assume that people coming from backgrounds where "black and white" aren't preached may have emmensly higher possibilities to get it right. Can someone check what backgrounds those test subjects had? --161.76.99.106 11:36, 22 March 2006 (UTC)


 * I think that you might be missing the point. The key with the Wason selection task is that we can re-phrase the task and ensure that nearly 100 % of the students get the question correct.


 * In particular, you set up 4 tables at a bar: One where every body is old, one where everybody is young, one where no one is drinking alcohol, and one where there are lots of beers. Now consider the law: If someone is under 21, then they must not drink alcohol. Nearly all the students will get this question correct. Yet this question is isomorphic to the original question concerning numbers/colors.


 * —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 74.136.211.147 (talk • contribs).

diagram caption is incorrect
The caption establishes an equivalence relation:

"The subject must choose which of these cards must be turned over to test that all cards with an even number on one side have red on the other side." This requires a different selection answer, as the 8, brown, and red cards must be turned over to guarantee equivalence. It is an implication in the article text:

"if a card shows an even number on one face, then its opposite face shows a primary colour"

The subtlety of implication is much of the point of the Wason selection task. I propose changing the caption to the following:

"The subject must choose which of these cards must be turned over to test that if a card shows an even number on one face, then its opposite face shows a primary colour."

--Metaxis (talk) 05:20, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Changed. Metaxis (talk) 23:39, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Good catch. Of course, someone came around and screwed up the caption again. I've fixed it and added a comment to the effect of "stop messing with this." TiC (talk) 17:17, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Different explanations
There are a heap of explanations for the task. I have added a bit more info, but more work needed, e.g., citations for the discovery that deontic versions of the task are easier. --Andy Fugard (talk) 21:52, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Group vs Individual Performance
Paul Krugman (NY Times 4/8/2010) cites a study using this task that seventy-five percent of the groups solved it, but only 14 percent of individuals did

There is an observation by a psychologist in this article that “he had never met an experimental subject who did not understand the logical solution when it was explained to him, and then agreed that it was correct” that may indicate why groups did so much better – because it would be relatively easy for a group to achieve a consensus once an individual had discovered the solution and shared it. It sure provides a shortcut for individuals who are using a mechanical method to solve the problem that are still sifting through possibilities when the solution goes viral in the group.

And that individuals fail more often because they loose patience or do not have enough time to execute a full mechanical search and must rely on people who reason or intuit the solution to present it for their affirmation. This behavior would be predictable for for problems having a large number of trial solutions that are subject to being solved by reasoning or intuition. Sudoku would be an example. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.200.165.130 (talk) 21:04, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Not distinct colours
Is there any particular reason why this article uses two deceptively alike colours, red and brown, to identify the cards? When I first looked at the picture, it was not clear to me that the cards were supposed to have two distinct colours. (Of course I see that they are different, but I would not object if someone showed me the brown card in isolation and called it red.) And I can only imagine how the picture looks if you are colour blind. What about changing from brown to blue? --Alatius (talk) 17:52, 13 July 2010 (UTC)


 * ColorFilter confirms that this is a problem; red and brown are about the worst possible colors to use here as they look very similar with the most common type of colorblindness and fairly similar across every kind of colorblindness. However there is no color scheme that will work for all people, other than dark vs. light. How about changing "colored patch" to "patterned patch," and "red and brown" to "striped and speckled?" TiC (talk) 17:42, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry to reopen an old thread, but 13 years later this still appears to be a problem. It was one of the first things I noticed about this article as I was very confused what colour the 4th card was.
 * I plan to change this to an obviously blue card that is distinct from the reddish-brown (and not green as it would then conflict with the background).
 * I acknowledge the suggestion for patterns, but I think this adds complexity. To handle colourblind accessibility, I'm going to:
 * - test the cards are obviously different colours at first glance, given different types of colourblindness (probably needs careful selection of the lightness values of the cards)
 * - put text on the cards that state their color (will do this with a translatable SVG so it's still easy to internationalize) Domdomegg (talk) 12:50, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

What is wrong with the standard formulation of the selection task, in which their are numbers on one side, and letters on the other?Logperson (talk) 07:46, 11 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I think having letters on the other side makes it harder to refer to the cards (e.g. 'card with an X' is longer than 'red card') and adds more cognitive complexity as people have to remember multiple symbols (rather than symbols on one side, and colors on another being very distinct). Domdomegg (talk) 12:46, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Surely the Cosmides/Tooby Task is Fundamentally Different
The article implies (and perhaps the researchers did too) that the "underage drinking" task posed by Leda Cosmides and John Tooby is structurally equivalent to the Wason selection task—that only the social context is different. Yet there seems to be a fundamental structural difference that largely accounts for the improved performance. In the Wason task, the description explicitly calls attention to the 8 card (via the phrase "even number"—a minor mathematical inference) and the red card. The brown card, though part of the solution, is not mentioned. Its significance must be inferred, and indeed this is the crux of the problem. But in the underage drinking task, age 16 (negatively via the phrase "over 18", which is a trivial mathematical inference rather than a fairly difficult logical one) and "drinking beer" (via the phrase "drinking alcohol") are explicitly highlighted in the task setup. Unless I'm misunderstanding something, the exact logical leap that makes the Wason task difficult (realizing that the brown card rather than the red card is significant even though the red card has been mentioned and the brown card has not) is precisely what is missing from the underage drinking task (where the cards mentioned in the task are in fact what you have to turn over).

I'm not sure this is a beef with the article; it may be with the research. But I am led to dismiss the assertion that the Cosmides/Tooby task is equivalent to the Wason task aside from the "social context". — Preceding unsigned comment added by OldPeculier (talk • contribs) 19:19, 24 February 2012 (UTC)


 * I see. You're saying that the relevance of "over 18" to "16" is more intuitively obvious, even without the social-contract context, than the relevance of "red" to "brown". I'm not sure I'd call that a "fundamental difference", but still, that's a plausible hypothesis — and a testable one, if we can create a social-contract context for "exactly 18". (Maybe, "room #12 is reserved for fifth-graders"; the cards could be "third-grader", "fifth-grader", "in room #12", "in room #17".) But yeah, that's definitely original research. :-/  —Ruakh TALK 20:37, 25 February 2012 (UTC)


 * what are you trying to do here? Are you working on a paragraph for possible inclusion in the article? If you want to do that, I'd suggest using your Sandbox rather than here, then post a note here asking for feedback. In your text, what work is done by the statement "These two and only these two can used."? Is seems you can use the other forms, they just won't be deductively valid. MartinPoulter (talk) 17:28, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

Miscommunication
Surely this is a test of miscommunication; the tester is not communicating the conditions clearly. Does this test rate differently in another language? Polypipe Wrangler (talk) 20:54, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Wording
It seems to me that the wording here is slightly wrong, or at least could be improved. It says " Which card(s) must you turn over in order to test the truth of the proposition that if a card shows an even number on one face, then its opposite face is red?". Note the word "shows" as in *currently* showing, not "has", as in implying an ongoing state of being. For instance, note that the brown card, specifically, is NOT showing a number at all, therefore one could argue, strictly speaking, that it is irrelevant to the actual question being asked. Fawcett5 (talk) 17:38, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Policing social rules example confusingly different from primary example
The correct answer to the first example (card two, the even number, and card four, the brown card), is unnecessarily different from the correct answer to the "Policing social rules" example (card *one*, the under 18yo, and card four, the alcoholic drink). Swapping the order of the 25 and 16 cards in the second graphic would bring the two examples back into agreement. M@ (talk) 03:27, 30 August 2016 (UTC)
 * The order of the cards is completely irrelevant in both tasks. --Arno Matthias (talk) 13:12, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

"Generalization" section
Is this section adding anything of value? It doesn't cite any sources, or seem to illustrate any concept not illustrated by the original. I can't quickly find any references to it, so it seems like it might even qualify as "original research." Will remove in a few days if no one objects. Personman (talk) 03:20, 15 February 2018 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Human Cognition SP23
— Assignment last updated by Ashley444 (talk) 23:16, 11 May 2023 (UTC)