Chapter 8: Organization of Declarative Knowledge

Basic concepts: 2. Prototype Theory: grouping things together not by defining

 Concept: A concept is an idea of something, a word or features but rather by their similarity to an averaged model
term that represents a "thing" held in memory. A concept of the category; it is an abstract average of all objects in the
can be a concrete object such as "apple" or an abstract category. e.g., prototypical birds. Whereas a defining
such as "justice," which is what we call as a construct. feature is shared by every single object in a category, a
 Category - Categories represent groups of concepts that characteristic feature need not to be.
are contained within one another. That is to say that the Example: stereotypes
category of fruit contains many concepts, including an
apple. And an apple, itself, is a concept, that contains Network: knowledge is represented in our minds in the form
various categories (red, green, yellow) each of which has of interconnected concepts or in web-form.
subcategories (red applies include Macintosh, Gala, Example: concept maps
Jonathan, Fuji, Braeburn, and many other varieties) Schematic Representations
 Network - A network represents connections between A "schema" is loosely defined as a mental framework for
concepts, but in a loose and happenstance manner: a red organizing knowledge. It is not as rigidly defined as a system
apple may be connected in a network to a sports car (both of categories or a semantic network, acknowledging that the
are red), a pecan (both grow on trees), a soccer ball (both way in which an individual organizes information is strongly
are round), etc. There is no apparent logic to the way that influenced by his life experience, making schemas highly
items in a network are connected. idiosyncratic. Schemas also influence behavior because they:
 Schema - A schema is a building block of knowledge; a  Influence where we focus our attention.
kind of network among items in various categories. It  Influence how we interpret and understand ourselves,
creates a meaningful structure of related concepts. others, and situations.
Concepts and Categories  Influence how we behave in different situations.
Since there is a large no. of concepts, our understanding of
Types of Schema Theory
things is based implicitly on categorization: to state that a cat
Different types of schema create the wireframe for the world
is an animal is essentially to indicate that a category of
we experience individually -- self-schema, event schema,
"animals" exists, that the members of this category have
object schema, role schema, gender schema, and person
certain properties that cause them to be included in that
schema are all examples of different types of schema.
category, and that other categories exist on the same level.
Natural categorization is one of the most basic methods, A. Self-Schema
which considers the nature of things, such that properties How we organise the information about ourselves and the
such as color, size, shape, location, etc. are used to sort things generalisations we have about who we are obtained from
into categories. Natural categories are fairly stable: a cat is an experiences are known as self-schema. Self-schemas are
animal and an apple is a fruit, and they will generally remain cultivated from what we think about, how we spend our time,
so for an indefinite amount of time. Bottomline, these are and what we care about.
groupings that occur naturally in the world. B. Event Schema
Event schemas focus on behaviour patterns that should be
This is opposed to functional categories (artifact category), followed for specific events. Event schemas are scripts that
which considers the purpose to which things are used, inform us of what to do, what to say, or how to act in a
providing categories such as food, writing instruments, particular situation. Much like being taught manners of
building materials, and the like. The stability of these saying "Please" and "Thank-you".
categories is also fairly stable, as it requires a permanent
C. Object Schema
change in behavior to cause an item to be included or
How do we know what objects are? Object schema allows us
excluded from a category - e.g., a horse-drawn carriage is
to understand the multitude of objects around us. Object
generally not considered in the category of transportation,
schema is why we can understand an individual object, how
though arguably it still serves as such in the rare instances it
that object works or functions, and what we can expect from
is used. These are groupings that are designed or invented by
them.
humans to serve particular purposes or functions.
D. Role Schemas
How do we put objects in their category? Feature, The norms and expectations of us as individuals with
Prototype, Theory-based particular societal roles are called role schemas. Role
1. Feature-based Categories: each feature is an essential schemas are broken into two categories: achieved and
element of the category. Together, the features uniquely ascribed.
define the category; they use defining features or necessary
attributes; “for a thing to be an X, it must that certain Achieved roles come from professions or occupations such as
feature otherwise, it is not an X.” makes categories appear police officers or teachers. Ascribed roles are social
so orderly and systematic categories like gender or age.