Advancing the specification of dual process models of higher cognition: a critical test of the hybrid model view

Dual process models of higher cognition have become very influential in the cognitive sciences. The popular Default-Interventionist model has long favoured a serial view on the interaction between intuitive and deliberative processing (or System 1 and System 2). Recent work has led to an alternative hybrid model view in which people’s intuitive reasoning performance is assumed to be determined by the absolute and relative strength of competing intuitions. In the present study, we tested unique new predictions to validate the hybrid model. We adopted a two-response paradigm with popular base-rate neglect problems in which base-rate information and a stereotypical description could cue conflicting responses. By manipulating the extremity of the base-rates in our problems we aimed to affect the strength of the “logical” intuition that is hypothesised to cue selection of the base-rate response. The two-response paradigm – in which people were required to give an initial response under time-pressure and cognitive load – allowed us to identify the presumed intuitively generated response. Consistent with the hybrid model predictions, we observed that experimentally reducing the strength of the logical intuition decreased the number of initial base-rate responses when solving problems in which base-rates and stereotypical information conflicted. Critically, reasoners who gave an initial stereotypical response were less likely to register the intrinsic conflict (as reflected in decreased confidence) in this case, whereas reasoners who gave an initial base-rate response registered more conflict. Implications and remaining challenges for dual process theorising are discussed.