Rationality & the Reflective Mind is the title of a book by Keith Stanovich. I began reading it about three weeks ago. He mentioned Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow so often that I decided to read Kahneman's book first.
Stanovich presents another dual process account of reasoning that differs from Kahneman's. Stanovich learned much from Kahneman, but has ventured beyond. He presents a tripartite theory and uses the labels Type 1 Process and Type 2 Process instead of Kahneman's labels System 1 and System 2. Type 1 is the autonomous mind. Type 2 consists of the algorithmic mind and the reflective mind.
"In my view, the defining feature of Type 1 processing is its autonomy--the execution of Type 1 processes is mandatory when their triggering stimuli are encountered, and they do not depend on input from high-level control systems" (19). Execution is rapid and does not put a heavy load on central processing capacity. The processes tend to operate in parallel without interfering with one another or Type 2 processing.
Type 2 processing is non-autonomous. It is relatively slow and computationally expensive. Type 2 is largely serial, often language-based, and may override Type 1 processing. It prevails when decisions and judgments are called for.
He doesn't use the terms volitional and non-volitional, but these are synonyms of non-autonomous and autonomous, respectively.
The difference between the algorithmic mind and reflective mind is captured in the distinction between cognitive ability and thinking dispositions, or cognitive styles. Many thinking dispositions concern beliefs, belief structure, and attitudes toward changing beliefs. Others concern goals and goal hierarchy. Particular dispositions investigated by psychologists are: active open-minded thinking, the tendency of thinking, considering future consequences, and more. They include the following tendencies:
- to collect information before deciding
- to seek various points of view before deciding
- to calibrate strength of opinion
- to explicitly weigh pluses and minuses
- to seek nuance and avoid absolutism.
Individual differences in thinking dispositions assess goal management, epistemic values and self-regulation.
This book is a more challenging read than Kahneman's book so far. The topic of my next post --- intelligence tests and critical thinking tests -- will likely seem easier to a reader.
I give a hat tip to David Potts for mentioning this book.
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