No evidence that reversibility affects causal judgments in late-preemption cases

Bibliographic Data

ID21591905
AuthorsPaul Henne (0000-0002-3526-2911, Lake Forest College, corresponding author), Karla Perez (0000-0002-7913-0523, MIT), Chad McCracken (Philosophy and Politics, Lake Forest College)
Year2026
Volume39
Issue2
Pages396-407
Publication date2026-02-17
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenuePhilosophical Psychology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0951-5089 • E-ISSN: 1465-394X
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/09515089.2024.2407490
OpenAlexW4402812675
LanguageEN
References cited30

Recently, Ross and Woodward (2022) argued that the reversibility of an outcome – that is, whether the outcome can be undone – affects causal judgments. One prediction of their account is that reversibility affects causal judgments in late-preemption scenarios, where people typically judge that events that produce the outcome earlier are more causal than preempted alternative events that would have otherwise produced the outcome. Ross and Woodward’s account predicts that when the outcome is reversible, people would judge these events similarly – as in standard overdetermination cases. In three experiments, we found no evidence that reversibility affects causal judgments in late-preemption cases. We discuss how these results affect the experimental philosophy and cognitive science of causation, causal modeling, and experimental jurisprudence

Cognitive psychology · Cognitive science · Preemption · Child and Animal Learning Development · Computer Science · Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics · Psychology · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment · Social Psychology

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