This article presents a fundamental advance in the theory of mental models as an explanation of reasoning about facts, possibilities, and probabilities. It postulates that the meanings of compound assertions, such as conditionals ("if") and disjunctions ("or"), unlike those in logic, refer to conjunctions of epistemic…

This study investigated whether the mere knowledge of the meaning of variables can facilitate inquiry learning processes and outcomes. Fifty-seven college freshmen were randomly allocated to one of three inquiry tasks. The concrete task had familiar variables from which hypotheses about their underlying relations could be inferred. The…

This Action Research project and Pilot Study was designed and implemented to improve students' hypothetical thinking abilities by exploring the possibility that learning and playing the computer game Minesweeper may inherently help improve hypothetical thinking. One objective was to use educational tools to make it easier for students to learn the…