Journal article
D. Gentner, David Yeh
2005
2005
Semantic Scholar
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Cite
APA
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Gentner, D., & Yeh, D. (2005). Reasoning Counterfactually in Chinese: Picking up the Pieces.
Chicago/Turabian
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Gentner, D., and David Yeh. “Reasoning Counterfactually in Chinese: Picking up the Pieces” (2005).
MLA
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Gentner, D., and David Yeh. Reasoning Counterfactually in Chinese: Picking up the Pieces. 2005.
BibTeX Click to copy
@article{d2005a,
title = {Reasoning Counterfactually in Chinese: Picking up the Pieces},
year = {2005},
author = {Gentner, D. and Yeh, David}
}
Abstract
We review the controversy concerning whether the lack of a clear counterfactual marker in Chinese results in a deficiency in counterfactual reasoning (Au, 1983, 1984; Bloom, 1981, 1984; Liu, 1985). We describe a study in which we compared two kinds of counterfactual assertions. The results showed an accuracy advantage for English speakers over Chinese speakers when specific contextual information was required to detect the counterfactual, but not on other counterfactual sentences. Implications for language and thought are discussed.