The impact of egocentric vs. allocentric attributions on the neural bases of reasoning about social rules

We usedthe “standard” and “switched” social contractversionsoftheWasonSelection- task toinvestigatetheneuralbasesofhumanreasoningaboutsocialrules.Boththese versions typicallyelicitthedeonticallycorrectanswer,i.e.theproperidentification ofthe violations ofaconditionalobligation.Onlyinthestandardversionofthetask,however, this responsecorrespondstothelogicallycorrectone.Wetookadvantageofthis differential adherencetologicalvs.deonticalaccuracytotestthedifferentpredictionsof logic rule-basedvs.visuospatialaccountsofinferentialabilitiesin14participantswho solved thestandardandswitchedversionsoftheSelection-taskduringfunctional- Magnetic-Resonance-Imaging.Bothversionsactivatedthewellknownleftfronto-parietal network ofdeductivereasoning.Thestandardversionadditionallyrecruitedthemedial parietal andrightinferiorparietalcortex,previouslyassociatedwithmentalimageryand with theadoptionofegocentricvs.allocentricspatialreferenceframes.Theseresults suggest thatvisuospatialprocessesencodingone'sownsubjectiveexperienceinsocial interactions maysupportandshapetheinterpretationofdeductiveargumentsand/orthe resulting inferences,thuscontributingtoelicitcontenteffectsinhumanreasoning.