IB psychology - Schema theory

What is a schema?

A scheme is a mental representation that enables us to organize our knowledge into categories.

What are schemas function?

Our schemas help us simplify our interaction with the world. They are mental shortcuts that can both help us and hurt us.

What do we use schemas for?

We use our schemas to learn and think about more quickly. However, some of out schemas may also be stereotypes that cause us to misinterpret or incorrectly recall information.

What type of schemas are there?

There are many types of schemas, including object, person, social, event, role and self-schemas.

How are schemas modified?

Schemas are modified as we gain more information. This process can occur through assimilation or accommodation

Describe a role schema.

Role schema are about proper behaviours in given situations.

Describe a self schema.

Self schemas are about oneself. We also hold idealized or projected selves or possible selves. Expectations about the self that organize and guide the processing of self-relevant information.

Describe a person schema.

Person schemas are about individual people. Expections based on personality traits. What we associate with a certain typer of person.

Describe a event schema.

Event schemas are about what happened in specific situations. Expectations about sequences of events in social situations

What are studies that investigate the schema theory?

Bransford & Johnson and Bartlett.

Bransford & Johnson aim.

To Investigate the effect of context on comprehension and memory of text passages.

Bransford & Johnson method.

A prerecorded passage was played to the participants, and the participants were to recall it as accurately as possible

1. They heard the passage once

2. They heard the passage twice

3. The people were provided a context picture before the passage was played (30 seconds)

4. The people were provided a context picture after they heard the passage

5. Context pic before the passage, but objects were rearranged

Bransford & Johnson results.

The recollection of the sample was measured in idea units.

- Without context = 3.6 IU

- Without context x 2 = 3.8 IU

- Context before = 8 IU

- Context after = 3.6 IU

- Partial context = 4 IU

Bransford & Johnson conclusion.

- People who were shown context before were able to recollect the most of the data in the passage.

- Showing the context prior to the playing of the passage influences the people to organize their knowledge according to the picture/context (schema)

Bransford & Johnson strenghts.

construct validity

The variation of variables being tested allows for the theory to be tested in several ways, meaning there is little reliance on a limited foundation of information. Because it was a laboratory experiment, it is inherently well-controlled.

temporal validity

The study and how it is conducted allows for it to be replicated throughout time, not relying on unique aspect of today's society. It has very little reliance on technology, apart from the passage being played.

Bransford & Johnson weaknesses.

Because individual schemas affect how one views their surroundings, it may have had a slight effect on their remembrance of the story, aside from the context or lack thereof.

Bartlett aim.

To investigate how the memory of a story is affected by previous knowledge and see if cultural background and unfamiliarity with a text would lead to distortion of memory when the story was recalled.

Bartlett method.

british participants were told a native american legend called the war of ghosts, which was filled with unknown names and concepts. There were two conditionsc1: was repeated reproduction, where participants were required to reproduce the story a short time after hearing it and then do so repeatedly over a period of timec2: serial reproduction, where participants were required to recall the story and repeat it to another person.

Bartlett results.

participants remembered the main theme of the story. participants in both conditions changed the story as they tried to remember.three patterns of distortion: assimilation, leveling and sharpening.

Bartlett conclsuion.

This study supports schema theory because it demonstrates the impact our schemas have on the encoding and retrieval of information. For example the participant may have not encoded the details that were inconsistent of their schema of culture, which could explain why they missed out some information upon recalling it (levelling). In addition to that, participants may have remembered the events in the story in a different order that was more fitting with their schemas, this would explain sharpening. Lastly, participants may have not encoded unfamiliar ideas as they were and, instead, changed them to fit their cultural schema.

Bartlett strenghts.

Despite that it's a lab experiment, it has high ecological validity since hearing a story that isn't in line with our cultural schema is a very common and realistic experience.

Bartlett weaknesses.

Not strongly controlled → participants didn't receive standardised instructions or standardised time after which they had to recall the storyBartlett did not instruct the participants to be as accurate as possibleLow cross-cultural validity because the participants were all British + not generalisable to the total population because they were all men.No control group or group of native Americans participated to verify whether or not the distortion was caused by the cultural dissimilarity.

Schema Theory evaluation.

1. Lots of research to support the theory. Useful for understanding how people categorise information.

2. Contributed to understanding of how cognition develops in children.

3. Helps us to understand cultural and gender differences, since different cultures and genders may have different schemas which influence their thinking.

4. Methodological flaws with some research5. Low ecological validity

6. Cohen (1993) states that schema theory is rather vague and fails to offer detailed explanations of how the schemas are acquired in the first place. It is a reductionist approach.

7. Some schemas appear to localise in particular areas of the brain