Franziska Keßler participated in the virtual conference of experimental psychologists (TeaP) taking place from March 13 - 15, 2021. She presented results from her research with the topic Enhancing sensitivity for causal structures: Implications for complex problem solving” (Franziska Kessler, Antje Proske, Micah Goldwater, Florian Krieger, Leon Urbas, Samuel Greiff, Susanne Narciss).

Abstract

The ability to perceive the causal structure of problem situations across multiple contexts is associated with expertise, whereas novices are more likely to concentrate on more salient superficial characteristics. Goldwater and Gentner (2015) showed that an intervention combining explication of causal models and structural alignment of two situations from disparate fields with the same underlying causal model significantly increased the sensitivity for causal structures. Going beyond this finding, we extended this intervention with inference questions and combined it with a subsequent complex problem solving (CPS) task, to investigate whether an enhanced sensitivity for causal structures would result in better performance in CPS. In this study (N = 108) we used the MicroDYN framework (Greiff, Wüstenberg, & Funke, 2012) as a measure for CPS. MicroDYN allows the extraction of different CPS performance indicators (knowledge acquisition, knowledge application, strategy). Comparison of CPS performance indicators among three experimental groups (intervention, intervention extended with inference questions, control group) revealed the following results: 1) the effectiveness of the intervention in increasing the sensitivity for causal structures was replicated, 2) the association between the strength of sensitivity for causal structures and performance indicators in MicroDYN was confirmed, and 3) comparison between experimental groups did not reveal differences in performance in CPS. However, those subjects whose sensitivity was increased by the intervention (i.e., intervention responders) did perform better than the control group for the indicators knowledge acquisition and strategy, but not for the indicator knowledge application.