Schemas - year 10 GCSE psychology

Schema

A mental framework we have of what we already know and believe about the world around us

Assilmilate

Changing one’s schemas to fit what they learned

Accommodate

Changing our memories to keep one’s schemas intact and unchanged

Leveling

Involves removing or downplaying details from the memory

Sharpening

Involves adding or exaggerating details

Confabultation

Schemas filling in gaps in our memory

Fredrick Bartlett

Psychologist that came up with the idea of schemas, as well as the creator of the “Bartlett - War of the Ghosts” study that proved his theory of schemas due to cultural unfamiliarization

Elizabeth Loftus

Psychologist that supported Bartlett’s idea and argued that the reconstructive memory implies that eye witnesses to crimes can often be unreliable