Denial of true-false statements and verbal ability

Abstract

Sixteen high-verbal and 16 low-verbal university students were asked to deny ordinarily true statements (e.g., A ship is large), partially false statements (e.g., A dog is large), and utterly false statements (e.g., A fly is large). High-verbal students used affirmative statements 57% of the time to ordinarily true statements, 69% of the time to partially false statements, and 87% of the time to utterly false statements. Low-verbal students did not distinguish the three types of statements. The findings were discussed in terms of the role of verbal ability and stylistics in the English language. © 1985, The psychonomic Society, Inc.. All rights reserved.