In psychology and cognitive science, a schema (plural schemata or schemas) describes a pattern of
thought or behavior that organizes categories of information and the relationships among them. [1] It can
also be described as a mental structure of preconceived ideas, a framework representing some aspect of
the world, or a system of organizing and perceiving new information. [2] Schemata influence attention and
the absorption of new knowledge: people are more likely to notice things that fit into their schema, while
re-interpreting contradictions to the schema as exceptions or distorting them to fit. Schemata have a
tendency to remain unchanged, even in the face of contradictory information. Schemata can help in
understanding the world and the rapidly changing environment. [3] People can organize new perceptions
into schemata quickly as most situations do not require complex thought when using schema, since
automatic thought is all that is required.[3]
People use schemata to organize current knowledge and provide a framework for future understanding.
Examples of schemata include academic rubrics, social schemas, stereotypes, social
roles, scripts, worldviews, and archetypes. In Piaget's theory of development, children construct a series
of schemata, based on the interactions they experience, to help them understand the world. [4]
History[edit]
Before psychology separated from philosophy, the term "schema" was prominently discussed in
philosophy by Immanuel Kant.[5]
Early developments of the idea in psychology emerged with the gestalt psychologists and Jean Piaget:
the term "schema" was introduced by Piaget in 1923. [6] The concept was popularized in psychology and
education through the work of the British psychologist Frederic Bartlett,[7] who drew on the term body
schema used by neurologist Henry Head. It was expanded into schema theory by educational
psychologist Richard C. Anderson.[8] Since then, other terms have been used to describe schema such as
"frame", "scene" and "script".
Schematic processing[edit]
Through the use of schemata, a heuristic technique to encode and retrieve memories, the majority of
typical situations do not require much strenuous processing. People can quickly organize new
perceptions into schemata and act without effort. [9]
However, schemata can influence and hamper the uptake of new information (proactive interference),
such as when existing stereotypes, giving rise to limited or biased discourses and expectations
(prejudices), lead an individual to "see" or "remember" something that has not happened because it is
more believable in terms of his/her schema.[10] For example, if a well-dressed businessman draws a knife
on a vagrant, the schemata of onlookers may (and often do) lead them to "remember" the vagrant pulling
the knife. Such distortion of memory has been demonstrated. (See Background research below.)
Schemata are interrelated and multiple conflicting schemata can be applied to the same information.
Schemata are generally thought to have a level of activation, which can spread among related schemata.
Which schema is selected can depend on factors such as current activation, accessibility, priming and
emotion.
Accessibility is how easily a schema comes to mind, and is determined by personal experience and
expertise. This can be used as a cognitive shortcut; it allows the most common explanation to be chosen
for new information.
With priming, a brief imperceptible stimulus temporarily provides enough activation to a schema so that it
is used for subsequent ambiguous information. Although this may suggest the possibility of subliminal
messages, the effect of priming is so fleeting that it is difficult to detect outside laboratory conditions.
Furthermore, the mere exposure effectwhich requires consciousness of the stimuliis far more
effective than priming.
Background research[edit]
The original concept of schemata is linked with that of reconstructive memory as proposed and
demonstrated in a series of experiments by Bartlett.[11] By presenting participants with information that was
unfamiliar to their cultural backgrounds and expectations and then monitoring how they recalled these
different items of information (stories, etc.), Bartlett was able to establish that individuals' existing
schemata and stereotypes influence not only how they interpret "schema-foreign" new information but
also how they recall the information over time. One of his most famous investigations involved asking
participants to read a Native American folk tale, "The War of the Ghosts", and recall it several times up to
a year later. All the participants transformed the details of the story in such a way that it reflected their
cultural norms and expectations, i.e. in line with their schemata. The factors that influenced their recall
were:
Omission of information that was considered irrelevant to a participant;
Transformation of some of the details, or of the order in which events, etc., were recalled; a shift
of focus and emphasis in terms of what was considered the most important aspects of the tale;
Rationalization: details and aspects of the tale that would not make sense would be "padded out"
and explained in an attempt to render them comprehensible to the individual in question;
Cultural shifts: the content and the style of the story were altered in order to appear more
coherent and appropriate in terms of the cultural background of the participant.
Bartlett's work was crucially important in demonstrating that long-term memories are neither fixed nor
immutable but are constantly being adjusted as schemata evolve with experience. In a sense it supports
the existentialist view that people construct the past and present in a constant process of
narrative/discursive adjustment, and that much of what people "remember" is actually confabulated
(adjusted and rationalized) narrative that allows them to think of the past as a continuous and coherent
string of events, even though it is probable that large sections of memory (both episodic and semantic)
are irretrievable at any given time.[11]
An important step in the development of schema theory was taken by the work of D.E. Rumelhart
describing the understanding of narrative and stories. [12] Further work on the concept of schemata was
conducted by W.F. Brewer and J.C. Treyens, who demonstrated that the schema-driven expectation of
the presence of an object was sometimes sufficient to trigger its erroneous recollection. [13] An experiment
was conducted where participants were requested to wait in a room identified as an academic's study and
were later asked about the room's contents. A number of the participants recalled having seen books in
the study whereas none were present. Brewer and Treyens concluded that the participants' expectations
that books are present in academics' studies were enough to prevent their accurate recollection of the
scenes.
In the 1970s, computer scientist Marvin Minsky was trying to develop machines that would have human-
like abilities. When he was trying to create solutions for some of the difficulties he encountered he came
across Bartlett's work and decided that if he was ever going to get machines to act like humans he
needed them to use their stored knowledge to carry out processes. To compensate for that he created
what was known as the frame construct, which was a way to represent knowledge in machines. His frame
construct can be seen as an extension and elaboration of the schema construct. He created the frame
knowledge concept as a way to interact with new information. He proposed that fixed and broad
information would be represented as the frame, but it would also be composed of slots that would accept
a range of values; but if the world didn't have a value for a slot, then it would be filled by a default value.
[14]
Because of Minsky's work, computers now have a stronger impact on psychology. In the 1980s, David
Rumelhart extended Minsky's ideas, creating an explicitly psychological theory of the mental
representation of complex knowledge.[15]
Roger Schank and Robert Abelson developed the idea of a script, which was known as a generic
knowledge of sequences of actions. This led to many new empirical studies, which found that providing
relevant schema can help improve comprehension and recall on passages. [16]
conjecture
knjekCHr/
noun
plural noun: conjectures
1. 1.
an opinion or conclusion formed on the basis of incomplete information.
"conjectures about the newcomer were many and varied"
synony speculation, guesswork, surmise, fancy, presumption, assumption, theory, postulation, s
ms: upposition; More
o
o
verb
3rd person present: conjectures
1. 1.
form an opinion or supposition about (something) on the basis of incomplete
information.
"he conjectured the existence of an otherwise unknown feature"
synony guess, speculate, surmise, infer, fancy, imagine, believe, think, suspect, presume, assum
ms: e, hypothesize, suppose
"I conjectured that the game was over"
7 Propaganda Techniques
for Students to Understand
Published on August 15, 2014
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Sheri Rose
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Editorial Services Professional & Content Cultivator
Use this whole class lesson to help students learn how they are targets of
advertisers. Get your students into the language of advertising and build
in them an understanding of the propaganda techniques used to influence
them to do things, feel things, and believe things that may or may not be
good for them.
Start with inquiry and class discussion for a critical analysis of the
propaganda techniques used in the advertisements below. Use these as
daily mini-lessons or teach them over the course of a couple of days. Let
the questions guide each discussion, alter the questions to fit your
instructional needs or come up with some questions of your own.
The key is to help students begin an awareness of and ability to identify
how their outlook on life is related to the advertisements they see.
Step 1: Whole Class Instruction - Analyzing
Advertisements for Propaganda Techniques
1. Glittering Generalities
Words of praise for product or person; nice words like goodness or
patriotism
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What word(s) identifies this advertisement as an
example of Glittering Generalities?
How does the layout of the advertisement emphasize
the propaganda technique?
How do the font styles, colors, subtext, background
colors, props and photography techniques emphasize
the propaganda technique?
Is this advertisement effective? Why? Why not?
What other observations do you have about the way
the Glittering Generalities technique is used in this
advertisement?
2. Name Calling
Trash-talking another product or person
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What is the fight?
No language is used, but what in the illustration
shows rivalry?
Examine the objects in the illustration. What other
observations do you have that indicate this as an
example of Name Calling propaganda?
Would language enhance this advertisement? Why?
Why not? If so, what words would you add to show
Name Calling propaganda?
What other observations do you have about the way
the Name Calling technique is used in this
advertisement?
3. Testimonial
A famous person recommends a product or a political endorsement
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
Who is the famous person?
How does the endorsement by this person make the
product seem like it is worth the purchase?
Examine font styles, colors, and page layout. What
do they suggest about the product, and how do they
strengthen the power of the testimonial?
What other observations do you have about the way
Testimonial propaganda is used in this
advertisement?
4. Plain Folks
Appeals to regular people and their values such as health, family and
patriotism
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What is this advertising suggesting will happen if
regular people eat Subway?
How does this advertisement appeal to regular
people?
Why does the use of this regular guy appeal to
regular people?
Notice the only word used is the company logo. How
and/or why is this effective?
What comparison is shown that supports the
usefulness of the product?
What other observations do you have about the way
Plain Folks propaganda is used in this advertisement?
5. Bandwagon
An appeal to be part of the group
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What language is used to suggest that eating this
cereal is in the best interest of the audience?
Examine font styles, colors, language and page
layout. What do they suggest about the product, and
how do they strengthen the power of the Bandwagon
technique?
What other observations do you have about the way
Bandwagon propaganda is used in this
advertisement?
6. Transfer
An appeal that helps a person imagine themselves as part of a picture
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What is this advertisement suggesting about the
president?
How does the layout and background create an
image for America and/or the president?
What is the tone of this image? Positive? Negative?
How can you tell?
What other observations do you have about the way
Transfer propaganda is used in this advertisement?
7. Card-stacking
Manipulating information to make a product appear better than it is,
often by unfair comparison or omitting facts
Who is the target audience? What evidence suggests
this?
What in this advertisement suggests the product is
good and/or that facts may be omitted?
Examine font styles, colors, and page layout. What
do they suggest about the product, and how do they
strengthen the power of the card-stacking technique?
Notice the adjectives used in the description. How
does word choice affect the idea that smoking is a
great thing?
What other observations do you have about the way
Card-stacking propaganda is used in this
advertisement?
Step 2: Group Project - Analyzing Advertisements
for Propaganda Techniques
From Web Quest - Propaganda Techniques
"Use magazine ads to locate an example of each propaganda
technique. In cooperative groups, create a collage about the
propaganda techniques. Identify the techniques used in the ads."
Step 3: Begin Unit of Study
From GoTeachGo: Selling Out The Kids - A Graphic Novel
Expose' on the Advertising Industry
GoTeachGo offers 3 grade level ranges for this unit of study.
4-5
6-8
9-12
************************************************
Be sure to visit TeachersPayTeachers to examine lots of great PBL
units of study from GoTeachGo.
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