关键词: 启发式系统, 分析系统, 信息充分性, 信息情绪性

Abstract: Dual-process theories of reasoning posit two distinct but interactive processes that compete for control of the response that participants make in reasoning tasks. Heuristic system is an automatic belief-based system that is characterized as rapid, implicit, associative, and heavily contextualized. While analytic system is a demanding logic-based system that is described as slow and sequential but capable of abstraction and generalization. The present study investigated the potential influence of characteristics of information on both heuristic and analytic system, and the moderation effect of time pressure. With a 2 (passive information vs. active information) × 2 (adequate information vs. inadequate information) between-subject design, we examined how the emotional and adequate information influenced the heuristic system and analytic system respectively. The current sample consisted of 121 students, 61 for experiment 1 and 60 for experiment 2, and participants were required to perform a syllogistic reasoning task that was about the description of unconventional emergency. In experiment 1, participants made reasoning response without any time limit, while in experiment 2, they had to response under time pressure. Our hypothesis was that adequate information had significant effect on analytic system, while emotional information had significant effect on heuristic system, and both effects were modulated by time pressure. According to dual-process theories, two indices, logic index and belief index, were calculated respectively to reflect how heuristic system and analytic system work. The logic index measures the difference between acceptance of valid and invalid conclusions: the bigger the index, the more logical the responding. And the belief index similarly measures the difference in acceptance of believable and unbelievable conclusion: the bigger the index, the more belief bias is observed. In experiment 1, for logic index, MNOVA showed a significant main effect of adequacy of information, F(1, 57)=4.295, partialη2=0.07, p<.05. Participants’ logic indices were significantly higher when they were provided adequate information. For belief index, MNOVA showed a significant interaction between emotion and adequacy of information, F(1, 57)=4.507, partialη2=0.073, p<.05. As predicted, when adequate information was provided, the belief indices of participants who obtained positive information were significantly higher than those who obtained negative information. In experiment 2, for logic index, MNOVA showed a significant main effect of emotion of information, F(1, 56)=4.281, partialη2=0.071, p<.05. Participants’ logic indices were higher when they faced with positive information. However, for belief indices, no main effects and interaction were found. These findings indicated that both emotional and adequate information had effects on reasoning, and the effects were modulated by time pressure. The adequacy of information influenced reasoning process mainly through analytic system, while emotional information could influence both analytic and heuristic system. In other words, compared with negative information, positive information facilitated heuristic system under no time pressure condition, but facilitated analytic system under time pressure condition. The results were discussed under dual-process theories.

Key words: analytic system, heuristic system, emotional information, adequate information