Schema Theory and Research Studies

Schema Theory

Argues that schemas exist to organize information about the world, and to help us make generalizations to more quickly understand the new information we are constantly processing. Schema plays a key role in top-down processing and can affect memory in multiple stages (encoding, storage, and retrieval).

Schema

A mental representation, or mental framework, based on previous experience and knowledge, that organizes our information about (and allows us to make sense of) the world

Person Schemas

Pre-existing knowledge about specific individuals you know (their personality, likes and dislikes, appearance, behaviors, interests, etc.)

Object Schemas

Schemas for what properties an object (or animal) should have; we develop these through learning and experiences (example: triangles have three sides, a refrigerator has doors and food inside, etc.)

Social Schemas

General knowledge about how people behave in certain social situations

Self Schemas

Schemas, derived from past experience, that represent a person's beliefs and feelings about their self (including their current self, past self and idealized future self)

Scripts (or Event Schemas)

General descriptions of what typically occurs, and when it occurs, in a particular situation or location; creates expectations for how things will go, based on previous experiences (for example, going to a restaurant, going to a job interview, etc.)

schema assimilation

Using existing schemas to understand the world, and sometimes apply the existing schema to cover more situations you encounter in the world (example: learning that cats are also pets; not just dogs). Does not require major adjustments or the creation of a new schema, but small additions might be added to the pre-existing schema.

schema accommodation

Changing existing schemas in major ways, or creating new schema, when a person learns new information (or has new experiences) that do not fit the previously existing schema

bottom-up processing

When information from sense receptors is sent to the brain to integrate and process. No previous learning is required and perceptions are only based on stimuli coming from one's current external environment (examples: feeling cold, feeling pain in your toe after stubbing it on something)

top-down processing

A schema-driven process that relies upon previous knowledge and experiences to form hypotheses (make sense of) about new incoming information from the senses

memory encoding

Neural processes that change an experience into the memory of that experience

memory storage

Creating a biological trace of the encoded information in memory, which is either consolidated into long term memory or lost

memory retrieval

The process of recalling information stored in memory in cognitive processes like thinking, problem solving, decision making, and more

AIM: Brewer and Treyens, 1981

To investigate the role played by schema in the encoding and retrieval of memory, as determined by their recall of items in an office

PARTICIPANT SAMPLE: Brewer and Treyens, 1981

86 college Psychology students

PROCEDURES: Brewer and Treyens, 1981

It’s more involved than this, but participants were seated in a makeshift office to theoretically wait for the researcher to get them and start the experiment. However, the experiment had already begun, as participants (after 35 seconds in the office were then brought to a different room where they were asked to remember the items located in that office, in one of 3 conditions (the recall condition, the drawing condition, and the verbal recognition condition)

FINDINGS: Brewer and Treyens, 1981

When the participants were asked to recall either by writing a paragraph or by drawing, they were more likely to recall items in the office that were congruent with their schema of an office. When they were only asked to select items from a list, they were more likely to identify the items that were incongruent with their office schema (such as the skull) - but those participants also had a higher rate of recalling objects that matched their schema but were not actually in the office.

CONCLUSION: Brewer and Treyens, 1981

Pre-existing schema for “an office” appear to have played a role in both the memory encoding and retrieval of the objects in the office

AIM: Loftus and Palmer, 1974

To investigate whether the use of leading questions would affect the estimation of the speed cars were going when they crashed

PROCEDURES: Loftus and Palmer, 1974

45 college students were divided into five groups. 7 films of traffic accidents were shown and the length of the films ranged from 5 to 30 seconds. Each participant watched all 7 films and then answered a questionnaire with several questions, but the critical question was when they were asked to estimate the speed of the cars involved in the accident. While 1 group was asked “How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?” the critical word hit was replaced by collided, bumped, smashed, or contacted in the other conditions.

FINDINGS: Loftus and Palmer, 1974

The mean estimates of speed were highest in the ‘smashed’ condition (40.8 mph) and lowest in the ‘contacted’ group (31.8 mph)

CONCLUSION: Loftus and Palmer, 1974

It appears that participants’ memory of an accident seen on video can be changed by using suggestive or leading questions