Organizing Knowledge Cognitively

People store knowledge in many different ways. The main storage types are: Concepts, Schemes and Scripts, and Personal Theories.

A concept is a system of grouping and categorizing our brain uses to sort and store information. Concepts change and adapt as the amount of knowledge about a particular subject changes and grows. For example, as a child we were told that dogs and cats are animals. The concept of an animal might have been something furry with four legs. As school progressed and we learned more about animals the concept changed to incorporate everything from mammals to amphibians to fish.

Limited concepts can lead to two things:

Theorists believe that creating a concept includes learning the distinct features and characteristics that are present in all examples of a concept. A good way to know if something is part of a concept is to identify the defining features of the concept and see if the object or event in question shares those defining features. For example, an animal must eat food, a plant must grow, and a vertebrate must have a spine. So, every example of an animal must have the defining feature or eating food, every plant must grow, and every vertebrate must have a spine to be included in the concept.

Most people have a mental prototype, or mental example of a concept. For example, when referring to the concept of "transportation" you might think of a car, bus, truck, or train, but not typically of a skateboard or a pogo stick. Once the prototype for a concept is found, compare new objects and experiences with that prototype. Objects or events similar to the prototype are readily accepted as instances of the concept. Objects and events that are different are often rejected as instances of the concept when, in fact, they are.

Exemplars are similar to the prototype except your concept was formed by a mixture of different examples. This helps to limit undergeneralization, a common problem with using the prototype alone. For example, when developing the concept of birds, not only learn about sparrows and pigeons but penguins and ostriches. By learning from a variety of examples, the concept is more complete and less susceptible to error.

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