It is broadly agreed that the processing of a word triad with a common remote associate (coherent triad) leads to its partial activation, which is the process underlying intuitive coherence judgments. The present studies demonstrate that this process not only is independent of the intention to find the common associate (CA), but rather may be…

Argues that discoveries concerning the essential properties of whole categories of word concepts are critical to essentialist intuitions. Reviews studies demonstrating that words and concepts are not used in accordance with essentialism, concluding that since essentialism is not vindicated by ordinary word use, it fails to undermine the cognitive…