I think, to some extent, a large part of the issue with these questions is that people are answering the question *they think you are asking*, not the question *you think you are asking*. In order to answer the question, first they have to figure out which of the various interpretations of the question you might be asking, which involves…
I think, to some extent, a large part of the issue with these questions is that people are answering the question *they think you are asking*, not the question *you think you are asking*. In order to answer the question, first they have to figure out which of the various interpretations of the question you might be asking, which involves building a model of you, and asking what information you are trying to ascertain - and critically, here, the answers are information used in building that model.
So, in the Linda example, that you have provided additional information in choice B gives additional information about A. They are not considered in isolation, because the first task a person's brain has to deal with, in interpreting the question, is figuring out who you are and what you are trying to ask. Since social justice comes up in the question, and feminist comes up in one of the answers, they guess that you're asking whether or not Linda is likely to be a feminist, -not- whether Linda is likely to be a bank teller. So they kind of mentally add an implicit "... and is not a feminist" to answer A, in order to make sense of the bizarre question you are asking. Once they do this, the question makes sense to them, and so they can complete the question by answering it. (In a sense, the two "bank teller" pieces of information in the answers cancel out as red herrings; unless you're familiar with formal logic, you have no experience with these kinds of questions, and so cannot understand what is being asked without spending a lot of time thinking about it.)
Remember: A person answering your question does not know what you are asking, they have to figure that out. The first step in answering a question must be figuring out what is being asked, and this additional pivot point creates a lot of apparent chaos in the final answer.
If you include this process in interpreting polls like this, a lot of them will make a lot more sense. The freedom case, for example, kind of trivially washes out: A lot of people are not, in fact, interpreting the second question in a sense that makes it a subset of their interpretation of the first question. In particular you likely have some group of people who are interpreting your answers in a temporal fashion (look at all the temporal words in your question and your answers - you've literally asked "when", when you meant something like "Under what set of circumstances"). Similarly, you probably have a group of people who are answering with a particular notion of "inappropriate" which may not be a proper superset of "sexually inappropriate" - and some other group of people, who may be interpreting "inappropriate" in the manner you expect, may be interpreting "sexually inappropriate" in a manner you -don't- expect.
For example, "Sleep with me or you're fired" - is this strictly speech, or is it something more? I'm not sure whether or not it would be included in "saying inappropriate things" by your definition, but it does seem like it could plausibly be included in "saying sexually inappropriate things" to a much greater degree, and I'm more confident in it being placed in that bucket than I am in it being placed in the theoretical superset. There's some kind of uncertainty principle in language, where greater specificity on one axis can force less specificity on another.
I think you are spot on here. When I read the Linda question and the two possible options, my first gut instinct is to compare the answers against each other, so she's a bank teller in either case and the only question is whether or not she is a feminist. In other words, the way the answers are intended to be read is "A: Linda is possibly a bank teller, or B: Linda is possibly a bank teller and possibly a feminist." but how my not so normal brain parses the answers are "A: Linda is ONLY a bank teller, or B: Linda is a bank teller and a feminist." Since the question strongly hints that Linda is almost certainly a feminist, and in fact I think it is more likely that she is a feminist than a bank teller, that answer seems more likely. In a sense, my brain is asking which answer is more likely correct, given that apparently bank teller is a given and the only question is whether she is a feminist.
Now, if I stop and think I recognize that it is a conjunction question, but it takes stopping because the answers provided give information about what the question meant. The specifics get in the way because we forget "we don't know whether or not she is a bank teller" when we are given two possible states of the world that both contain bank teller, making it feel like a True/False or other dichotomy. I wonder how many people would get it right if there was a third option "C: Linda is a bank teller, a feminist and a world class pastry chef", or something similar.
I think, to some extent, a large part of the issue with these questions is that people are answering the question *they think you are asking*, not the question *you think you are asking*. In order to answer the question, first they have to figure out which of the various interpretations of the question you might be asking, which involves building a model of you, and asking what information you are trying to ascertain - and critically, here, the answers are information used in building that model.
So, in the Linda example, that you have provided additional information in choice B gives additional information about A. They are not considered in isolation, because the first task a person's brain has to deal with, in interpreting the question, is figuring out who you are and what you are trying to ask. Since social justice comes up in the question, and feminist comes up in one of the answers, they guess that you're asking whether or not Linda is likely to be a feminist, -not- whether Linda is likely to be a bank teller. So they kind of mentally add an implicit "... and is not a feminist" to answer A, in order to make sense of the bizarre question you are asking. Once they do this, the question makes sense to them, and so they can complete the question by answering it. (In a sense, the two "bank teller" pieces of information in the answers cancel out as red herrings; unless you're familiar with formal logic, you have no experience with these kinds of questions, and so cannot understand what is being asked without spending a lot of time thinking about it.)
Remember: A person answering your question does not know what you are asking, they have to figure that out. The first step in answering a question must be figuring out what is being asked, and this additional pivot point creates a lot of apparent chaos in the final answer.
If you include this process in interpreting polls like this, a lot of them will make a lot more sense. The freedom case, for example, kind of trivially washes out: A lot of people are not, in fact, interpreting the second question in a sense that makes it a subset of their interpretation of the first question. In particular you likely have some group of people who are interpreting your answers in a temporal fashion (look at all the temporal words in your question and your answers - you've literally asked "when", when you meant something like "Under what set of circumstances"). Similarly, you probably have a group of people who are answering with a particular notion of "inappropriate" which may not be a proper superset of "sexually inappropriate" - and some other group of people, who may be interpreting "inappropriate" in the manner you expect, may be interpreting "sexually inappropriate" in a manner you -don't- expect.
For example, "Sleep with me or you're fired" - is this strictly speech, or is it something more? I'm not sure whether or not it would be included in "saying inappropriate things" by your definition, but it does seem like it could plausibly be included in "saying sexually inappropriate things" to a much greater degree, and I'm more confident in it being placed in that bucket than I am in it being placed in the theoretical superset. There's some kind of uncertainty principle in language, where greater specificity on one axis can force less specificity on another.
I think you are spot on here. When I read the Linda question and the two possible options, my first gut instinct is to compare the answers against each other, so she's a bank teller in either case and the only question is whether or not she is a feminist. In other words, the way the answers are intended to be read is "A: Linda is possibly a bank teller, or B: Linda is possibly a bank teller and possibly a feminist." but how my not so normal brain parses the answers are "A: Linda is ONLY a bank teller, or B: Linda is a bank teller and a feminist." Since the question strongly hints that Linda is almost certainly a feminist, and in fact I think it is more likely that she is a feminist than a bank teller, that answer seems more likely. In a sense, my brain is asking which answer is more likely correct, given that apparently bank teller is a given and the only question is whether she is a feminist.
Now, if I stop and think I recognize that it is a conjunction question, but it takes stopping because the answers provided give information about what the question meant. The specifics get in the way because we forget "we don't know whether or not she is a bank teller" when we are given two possible states of the world that both contain bank teller, making it feel like a True/False or other dichotomy. I wonder how many people would get it right if there was a third option "C: Linda is a bank teller, a feminist and a world class pastry chef", or something similar.