Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Behavioral studies and computer simulations of analogical retrieval suggest that the availability of surface matches in long-term memory (LTM) hinders the spontaneous retrieval of purely structural analogs. We investigated whether this competition effect still holds during hypothesis-generation, a goal-driven activity that entails a more profound and sustained consideration of the target situation. In two experiments, we obtained that the availability of a less isomorphic but more superficially similar item did not complicate retrieving a structural analog, thus suggesting that goal-driven activities such as hypothesis generation aid participants in overcoming the activation of a structurally suboptimal analog in working memory, as compared to pragmatically impoverished activities such as reading the target situation. However, the activation of the surface match hindered the successful application of structural matches that were successfully retrieved. Results render a more nuanced picture of the role of surface similarities in analogical thinking, traditionally restricted to the retrieval stage.