Lesson 1 Quiz: Inductive and Deductive Reasoning

Inductive and Deductive Reasoning

Let's say that you have a furry little animal, and you want to know what type it is. It has brown and red fur, green eyes, long whiskers and a tail. How do you know what type of animal it is? You read in a book that cats have fur, green eyes, long whiskers and a tail. Since your animal has all of those things, you conclude that you have a cat. Congratulations! You've just used reasoning skills to solve a problem. 

There are two main types of reasoning skills: inductive and deductive reasoning. Inductive reasoning is when you draw conclusions about a general group based on observations of a specific member or members of that group. Remember your cat? Let's say that she likes to drink milk and chase yarn. You notice that your friend's cat also likes to drink milk and chase yarn. Because these specific cats like milk and yarn, you conclude that all cats like to drink milk and chase yarn. You've used inductive reasoning to come to this conclusion. 

On the other hand, deductive reasoning is when you start with a universal truth and draw conclusions about specific circumstances based on that. For example, you know that cats are mammals. You also know that mammals have hearts. So, you conclude that your cat (and all other cats) has a heart. Of course, both inductive and deductive reasoning have problems. Just because you use reasoning to draw a conclusion doesn't mean that the conclusion is correct. If your premise isn't right to begin with, it might be incorrect. 

Let's look at another example. Say that you read that all cats like to eat fish. Your pet doesn't like to eat fish, so you conclude that she is not a cat. But, what if the first statement (that all cats like fish) isn't true? What if only most cats like fish? In that case, your cat might just be the exception to the rule, but that doesn't mean that she's not a cat.

Directions: Using the following prompts, determine if the following are example of deductive or inductive reasoning.