Two psychological sources of uncertainty bear implications for judgment and decision-making: external uncertainty is seen as stemming from properties of the world, whereas internal uncertainty is ...seen as stemming from lack of knowledge. The apparent source of uncertainty can be conveyed through linguistic markers, such as the pronoun of probability phrases (e.g., I am uncertain vs. It is uncertain). Here, we investigated whether and when speakers use different pronoun subjects as such linguistic markers (Exp. 1 and 2) and what hearers infer from them (Exp. 3 and 4). Speakers more often described higher probabilities and knowable outcomes with internal probability phrases. In dialogue, speakers mirrored the source of their conversational partner. Markers of the source had a main effect or interacted with the probability conveyed and speaker expertise to shape the judgments and decisions of hearers. For example, experts voicing an internal probability phrase were judged as more knowledgeable than experts using an external probability phrase whereas the result was the opposite for lay speakers. We discuss how these findings inform our understanding of subjective uncertainty and uncertainty communication theories.
Two psychological sources of uncertainty bear implications for judgment and decision-making: external uncertainty is seen as stemming from properties of the world, whereas internal uncertainty is ...seen as stemming from lack of knowledge. The apparent source of uncertainty can be conveyed through linguistic markers, such as the pronoun of probability phrases (e.g., I am uncertain vs. It is uncertain). Here, we investigated whether and when speakers use different pronoun subjects as such linguistic markers (Exp. 1 and 2) and what hearers infer from them (Exp. 3 and 4). Speakers more often described higher probabilities and knowable outcomes with internal probability phrases. In dialogue, speakers mirrored the source of their conversational partner. Markers of the source had a main effect or interacted with the probability conveyed and speaker expertise to shape the judgments and decisions of hearers. For example, experts voicing an internal probability phrase were judged as more knowledgeable than experts using an external probability phrase whereas the result was the opposite for lay speakers. We discuss how these findings inform our understanding of subjective uncertainty and uncertainty communication theories.
Abstract
In most previous studies of verbal probabilities, participants are asked to translate expressions such as
possible
and
not certain
into numeric probability values. This probabilistic ...translation approach can be contrasted with a novel which-outcome (WO) approach that focuses on the outcomes that people naturally associate with probability terms. The WO approach has revealed that, when given bell-shaped distributions of quantitative outcomes, people tend to associate
certainty
with minimum (unlikely) outcome magnitudes and
possibility
with (unlikely) maximal ones. The purpose of the present paper is to test the factors that foster these effects and the conditions in which they apply. Experiment 1 showed that the association of probability term and outcome was related to the association of scalar modifiers (i.e., it is certain that the battery will last
at least…
, it is possible that the battery will last
up to…
). Further, we tested whether this pattern was dependent on the frequency (e.g., increasing vs. decreasing distribution) or the nature of the outcomes presented (i.e., categorical vs. continuous). Results showed that despite being slightly affected by the shape of the distribution, participants continue to prefer to associate
possible
with maximum outcomes and
certain
with minimum outcomes. The final experiment provided a boundary condition to the effect, showing that it applies to verbal but not numerical probabilities.
In most previous studies of verbal probabilities, participants are asked to translate expressions such as possible and not certain into numeric probability values. This probabilistic translation ...approach can be contrasted with a novel which-outcome (WO) approach that focuses on the outcomes that people naturally associate with probability terms. The WO approach has revealed that, when given bell-shaped distributions of quantitative outcomes, people tend to associate certainty with minimum (unlikely) outcome magnitudes and possibility with (unlikely) maximal ones. The purpose of the present paper is to test the factors that foster these effects and the conditions in which they apply. Experiment 1 showed that the association of probability term and outcome was related to the association of scalar modifiers (i.e., it is certain that the battery will last at least…, it is possible that the battery will last up to…). Further, we tested whether this pattern was dependent on the frequency (e.g., increasing vs. decreasing distribution) or the nature of the outcomes presented (i.e., categorical vs. continuous). Results showed that despite being slightly affected by the shape of the distribution, participants continue to prefer to associate possible with maximum outcomes and certain with minimum outcomes. The final experiment provided a boundary condition to the effect, showing that it applies to verbal but not numerical probabilities.
