In a study, researchers gave participants the anagram "EAPNTLOH" and asked them to find the hidden word. One group was told to systematically test every possible letter arrangement until a word emerged. A second group was told to focus first on common English letter pairs (such as "th" and "ph") and to start consonants and vowels in plausible patterns. Members of the second group typically solved the puzzle in less than half the time.
The first group's strategy is best classified as:
- A
A heuristic, a mental shortcut that may sacrifice accuracy for speed
- Bcheck_circle
An algorithm, a step-by-step procedure that guarantees a solution
- C
An insight, a sudden grasp of the solution
- D
Functional fixedness, a barrier to problem solving
Explanation
An algorithm exhaustively tests possibilities and is guaranteed to find a solution, but can be slow. The second group used a heuristic—a faster shortcut that does not guarantee success.