System 2 and cognitive transparency: deliberation helps to justify sound intuitions during reasoning

Abstract

Recent dual-process work suggests that sound responses to reasoning tasks are often generated intuitively. This has led to the hypothesis that deliberation contributes to sound response justification rather than mere response generation. However, direct evidence supporting this justificatory role of deliberation remains sparse. To test this hypothesis, three studies examined whether people could properly justify their responses to classic bias problems (base rate neglect, bat and ball, and risky choice problems) when responses were given intuitively or after deliberation. Participants provided fast, intuitive responses under time pressure in a first block, followed by unconstrained, deliberative responses to the same problems in a second block, with justifications required in both cases. Results show participants generally struggled to properly justify intuitive correct responses but tended to properly justify deliberative correct responses. These findings suggest that deliberation helps articulate reasons for intuitions, highlighting its role in the justification of decisions.