Generating derived relational networks via the abstraction of common physical properties: A possible model of analogical reasoning

The aim of this study was to provide a demonstration of equivalence-equivalence responding based on the abstraction of common formal properties, thus extending the functional-analytic model of analogical reasoning shown by Barnes, Hegarty, and Smeets (1997). In Experiment 1, 9 college students were taught, using a delayed matching-to-sample procedure, to choose a particular nonsense syllable in the presence of each of four blue and four red geometric shapes. In a subsequent test, all 9 subjects demonstrated equivalence formation based on the abstraction of color by consistently matching nonsense syllables related to same-colored shapes to each other. Of these 9 subjects, 8 then showed equivalence-equivalence responding in which equivalence relations from the previous part of the experiment were related to other equivalence relations and nonequivalence relations were related to other nonequivalence relations. In Experiment 2, 3 out of 4 additional subjects showed this analogical-type responding based on larger relational networks than those established in Experiment 1, and in Experiment 3, 3 further subjects showed analogical responding based on the abstraction of the relatively complex property of age.