Systematicity As a Selection Constraint in Analogical Mapping

Analogy is often viewed as a partial similarity match between domains. But since between any two domains there are more partial similarities than good analogies, it follows that analogy is selective. Three experiments examined the selection constraint on which relations are mapped between a base and target in an analogy. In Experiment 1 subjects judged two matches to be included in an analogy an isolated match, and a match embedded in a larger mapping system. Subjects preferred the embedded match. In Experiments 2 and 3 subjects made analogical predictions about a target domain. Subjects predicted information that followed from a causal system that matched the base domain, rather than the information that was equally plausible, but that created an isolated match with the base. Results support Gentners 1983, 1989 structure- mapping theory that analogical mapping concerns systems and not individual predicates, and that attention to shared systematic structure constrains the selection of information to include in an analogy. Keywords Test construction psychology Structure mapping.