Insight and search in Katona's five-square problem

Experimental Psychology
Michael OllingerGünther Knoblich

Abstract

Insights are often productive outcomes of human thinking. We provide a cognitive model that explains insight problem solving by the interplay of problem space search and representational change, whereby the problem space is constrained or relaxed based on the problem representation. By introducing different experimental conditions that either constrained the initial search space or helped solvers to initiate a representational change, we investigated the interplay of problem space search and representational change in Katona's five-square problem. Testing 168 participants, we demonstrated that independent hints relating to the initial search space and to representational change had little effect on solution rates. However, providing both hints caused a significant increase in solution rates. Our results show the interplay between problem space search and representational change in insight problem solving: The initial problem space can be so large that people fail to encounter impasse, but even when representational change is achieved the resulting problem space can still provide a major obstacle to finding the solution.

References

Feb 28, 1995·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America·N Sternberg, R H Hoess
Apr 1, 1963·Scientific American·M SCHEERER
Oct 1, 2003·Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition·Gary Jones
Jan 23, 2004·Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition·Trina C Kershaw, Stellan Ohlsson
Jan 23, 2004·Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition·Edward P ChronicleThomas C Ormerod
Jul 18, 2012·Journal of Experimental Psychology. Learning, Memory, and Cognition·Michael ÖllingerGünther Knoblich
Sep 26, 2012·Psychological Research·Amory H DanekMichael Ollinger

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Citations

Aug 25, 2015·Frontiers in Psychology·Anna FedorMichael Öllinger
Dec 5, 2013·Cognition·Amory H DanekMichael Ollinger
Sep 7, 2016·Psychological Research·Michael ÖllingerEörs Szathmáry
Jan 14, 2017·Frontiers in Psychology·Erika BranchiniUgo Savardi
May 25, 2021·PsyCh Journal·Ze ZhangJing Luo

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