It has been proposed that processing sentential negation recruits the neural network of inhibitory control. In addition, inhibition mechanisms also play a role in switching languages for bilinguals. Since both processes may share inhibitory resources, the current study explored for the first time whether and how language-switching influences the processing of negation. To this end, two groups of Spanish-English bilinguals participated in an encoding-verification memory task. They read short stories involving the same two protagonists, referring to their activities in four (...) different scenarios in Spanish or English. Following each story, the participants received verification questions requiring “yes” or “no” responses depending on whether a given fact was correctly referred to one of the protagonists. Some of the verification questions were in the story’s original language and others in the alternate language. Results revealed that language-switching facilitated negative responses compared to affirmative responses, exclusively for questions switching from dominant language to non-dominant language. This effect might reflect that the domain-general mechanisms of inhibitory control are recruited at least partially for both language switch and negation process simultaneously, although this phenomenon is modulated by language dominance. (shrink)

In a series of experiments, Bott and Noveck (2004) found that the computation of scalar inferences, a variety of conversational implicature, caused a delay in response times. In order to determine what aspect of the inferential process that underlies scalar inferences caused this delay, we extended their paradigm to three other kinds of inferences: free choice inferences, conditional perfection, and exhaustivity in “it”‐clefts. In contrast to scalar inferences, the computation of these three kinds of inferences facilitated response times. Following a (...) suggestion made by Chemla and Bott (2014), we propose that the time it takes to compute a conversational implicature depends on the structural characteristics of the required alternatives. (shrink)

We present a meta-analytic review on the processing of negations in conditional reasoning about affirmation problems (Modus Ponens: “MP”, Affirmation of the Consequent “AC”) and denial problems (Denial of the Antecedent “DA”, and Modus Tollens “MT”). Findings correct previous generalisations about the phenomena. First, the effects of negation in the part of the conditional about which an inference is made, are not constrained to denial problems. These inferential-negation effects are also observed on AC. Second, there generally are reliable effects of (...) a negation in the clause referred to by the categorical premise, and these referred-negation effects are constrained to the logically fallacious AC and DA inferences. All findings are presented and discussed in relation to contemporary mental model (MM) and mental logic (ML) theories. It is argued that a double-negation elimination hypothesis provides a sufficient explanation of inferential-negation effects within both MM theory and ML theory, if the latter is extended by a validating search for counter examples. Both MM and ML theories adhere to a processing scheme that allows them to incorporate an account of referred-negation effects based on the thesis that counter-example frequency is modulated by the scope of a contrast class delineated by a false affirmative. We conclude that MM and ML theories provide adequate processing schemes to accommodate for the explanatory hypotheses, at least in principle. In practice, both approaches remain equivocal as regards the connectivity and interactivity with long-term memory knowledge invoked in generating, manipulating, and testing the mental representations of negative state of affairs. (shrink)

Ordinary people make moral judgments that are consistent with philosophical and legal principles. Do those judgments derive from the controlled application of principles, or do the principles derive from automatic judgments? As a case study, we explore the tendency to judge harmful actions morally worse than harmful omissions (the ‘omission effect’) using fMRI. Because ordinary people readily and spontaneously articulate this moral distinction it has been suggested that principled reasoning may drive subsequent judgments. If so, people who exhibit the largest (...) omission effect should exhibit the greatest activation in regions associated with controlled cognition. Yet, we observed the opposite relationship: activation in the frontoparietal control network was associated with condemning harmful omissions—that is, with overriding the omission effect. These data suggest that the omission effect arises automatically, without the application of controlled cognition. However, controlled cognition is apparently used to overcome automatic judgment processes in order to condemn harmful omissions. (shrink)