The syllogistic reasoning ability in its relationship with the preferred emotion regulation goals
The syllogistic reasoning ability in its relationship with the preferred emotion regulation goals

Summary/Abstract: The proposed paper initiates, at an exploratory level, the investigation of the relationship between the level of autonomy of the emotion regulation goals (measured with the scales of the Self-Regulation of Withholding Negative Emotions – SRWNE -, an instrument elaborated by Kim, Deci, and Zuckerman, in 2002) and the syllogistic reasoning processes (examined through a syllogistic task with two versions, with a different linguistic format, which presumably favor different reasoning processes: the M format, supposedly favoring the inference based on automatic recognition of learned syllogistic schemata, and the E format, presumably favoring general, harder, deliberate analytic processes). A total number of 91 first year students at the University of Fine Arts and Design from Cluj-Napoca (mean age: 20 years, 68 females, 20 males, 3 without a specified gender) participated at the study. The sample was randomly separated in two relatively equal groups, based on the administration order of the two versions of the syllogistic task. The results of the research indicate that the autonomy, as a social aspect of one’s functioning, may play a role in the link between the way people set their emotion regulation goals and the way they think deductively. More specifically, there were obtained, mostly, statistically significant or marginally significant positive correlations between the preference for the integrated (autonomous) emotion regulation goals and the performance for the valid syllogisms (and, correlatively, negative correlations between the performance for them and the preference for the externally controlled emotion regulation goals), particularly for the one-model ones and in the M version of the syllogistic task. The general pattern of the results in what respects the association between the performance for the invalid syllogisms and the preference for the investigated types of emotion regulation goals had similarities with the one obtained for the case of the valid syllogisms, but there were also important differences between them. The variation of the investigated correlations based on the considered type of syllogisms, on their linguistic format, or on the administration order of the two versions of the syllogistic task suggests that the studied relationship might not be explained solely based on some general thinking abilities, i.e. that more specific factors, related with the two versions of the syllogistic task, may be involved in that relationship (e.g., one’s argumentative experience, presumably associated with the autonomous choice of her/his goals). At the same time, the above-mentioned variation is important for a better understanding of the syllogistic reasoning, supporting the idea that different deductive processes may be usually implicated in the correct solving of the multiple-model valid syllogisms than the processes implicated in the correct solving of the multiple-model invalid ones, because the pattern of the correlations between the performance for them and the preference for the investigated emotion regulation goals was not the same (a result that contradicts the prediction of the mental model theory for the syllogistic reasoning that there should be no difference between the two types of multiple-model syllogisms regarding their solving and its relation with one’s argumentative experience, or personal autonomy).

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