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Some facts one simply cannot deny*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Jill G. De Villiers  and
Helen B. Tager Flusberg
Jill G. De Villiers
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology and Social Relations, Harvard University
Helen B. Tager Flusberg
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology and Social Relations, Harvard University
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Abstract

Two-, three-, and four-year-old children were tested on a variation of Wason's (1965) procedure for testing the effects of plausibility on the comprehension of negative statements. It was found that negatives about an exceptional item in an array, i.e. plausible negatives, were understood before implausible negatives. Reaction time data revealed that plausible negatives were also processed more rapidly for three- and four-year-olds. An additional effect on plausibility, namely the degree of confusability between the different items in an array, was proposed, and was found to become increasingly salient with age.

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Child Language , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , November 1975 , pp. 279 - 286
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

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References

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