The debate about semantic reference between Frege’s (1948)
descriptivism and Kripke’s (1972) causal theory of reference
has recently been approached through experimental
psychology. However, no consensus has been reached on the
direction of the results. While some studies face clear
methodological charges, even those that are currently
uncontested do not reach a mutual conclusion. We propose a
novel experimental paradigm with methodology designed to
evade the problems of previous studies. Contrary to the past
literature, we find a prevalence of descriptivists under lenient
criteria for consistency across trials, while under strict criteria
we find an equal amount of descriptivists and hybrids, with
low numbers of referentialists (causal theory of reference)
under both criteria. We suggest an interpretation of this result,
and where future research might head.