We process a tremendous amount of information every single day. Thus, our brain transforms everything we experience into neuronal information. Some of these inputs get dedicated attention and will be further processed by higher cognitive functions.
This ongoing process shapes our personal and cultural construction of the world and reality. It determines the way we perceive:
- ourselves and abilities,
- unfamiliar people and environments,
- familiar people and environments,
- the world and how it works,
- success, life, happiness, social relationships and other constructs,
- beliefs and attitudes.
Above processing information, our brain structures it in order to make retrieval and recall easy. This is an important survival mechanism: the faster our ancients could recall memory contents, the better their survival chances.
So, we come into the world with certain predispositions, whereas we process an enormous amount of information throughout time.
The attention (= importance), repetition time, and emotional content determine the dominance of certain information. This way, our worldview and way of thinking get shaped step by step.
Mental representations
Our knowledge of the world is mapped and stored in our brains as mental representations. These mental structures represent the environment we experience, whereas our memory groups similar experiences together to reveal patterns in interaction with the environment.
There are four main elements of structured mental representations:
- Categories
- Concepts
- Schemas
- Scripts
Let’s explore these through an example:
“Dog” is a category we probably all have stored in our mental system. However, the category “dog” can have a lot of subcategories, like “labrador”, “beagle”, or “bulldog”. Therefore, categories (like “dog”) are collections of instances treated as the same.
All our knowledge about the category “dog” is structured in a concept. Moreover, concepts provide additional information to our categories, like characteristics (big or small), abstract ideas (love, trust, friendship) and relationships (better than cats, best friend of humans).
As concepts are not existing isolated, whenever the concept “dog” is activated, all related concepts (like experiences, memories and knowledge) come up as well. These complex structures are called schemas.
Schemas are cognitive frameworks; as humans, we develop personal, social, event and self-schemas. For instance, “Dog training” or “day trip with my dog” are schemas related to our example.
Lastly, a script provides information about how certain events will unfold. For example, what happens when I enter the office, go to the grocery store, visit my parents or go with my dog for a walk?
Why is it important to understand mental structures?
The above-mentioned mental structures help us to organise and interpret information. They shape our reality and allow us to take shortcuts in interpreting the vast amount of information we process.
Whenever we execute a memory task, such as recall, recognition or judgment, we access the same underlying representational structure.
For example, a bundle of concepts and schemas get activated whenever we meet a new person, through which initial associations and judgements are formed.
The first structures we establish are the most dominant ones. If we grew up with parents telling us regularly how lazy we are, laziness becomes an essential part of our self-concept and self-schema. We identify ourselves with these information bundles and barely question their truth.
The stereotype threat phenomenon is an excellent example of this.
Stone & McWhinnie (2008) examined how a group of women who described themselves as above-average athletes performed on a golf exercise. They were told that the study would test “natural talent”. One group of athletes also said that men and women had previously performed differently on the exercise. They have been asked to give a 100%, although there may be gender differences in performance. As a result, the women who had previously been reminded of the gender difference showed significantly lower performance than those who had not. This result shows how stereotype threat can reduce performance in different areas of life.
Schmader et al. (2008) postulated that stereotype threat hinders people from accessing their mental resources efficiently. Thus, they can’t perform to their full potential.
Therefore, being able to shape these structures gives us an essential tool to grow and develop.
How can we change mental representations?
As mentioned before, our mental representations’ dominance highly depends on the level of attention, repetition time, and emotional content. Above this, the first structures we establish are the most dominant ones and often create the prototype inside a category. A prototype most closely symbolises a category.
Suppose someone has been raised strictly Christian and conservative. In that case, this person’s prototype of a woman will be mainly related to terms like “quiet, faithful, goes to church, family-oriented, married, devoted”. Above this, the person will likely perceive women who do not fit this prototype as “strange” or even “despicable”.
This is because our mind wants to verify existing information with new ones. It wants to focus on things that confirm our pre-existing beliefs and ideas. Therefore, beliefs, prejudices and stereotypes get stronger with time.
The most important rule to changing and shaping our mental representations is consciously drawing our attention to them.
We cannot change what we are not aware of, and once we are aware, we cannot help but change. – Sheryl Sandberg Share on XSo the first step is understanding and examining our core concepts and beliefs. I would recommend you start with the following ones:
- Self-Concept: Who am I, and how do I define myself? Do I believe in being able to achieve goals?
- Success-Concept: What does success mean to me? Do I feel like having control over it? Is success something I need to fight hard for?
- Happiness-Concept: What does happiness look like? How can I be happy?
- Relationship-Concept: What is the key to successful social interactions and long-term relationships? Reciprocity? Authority? Acceptance? Can I build trust?
(Soon, I will upload a tool that helps you uncover these concepts.)
As soon as you know these mental structures, you can examine where they come from. Are they related to your childhood, family, society, media or personal experiences?
From now on, you can consciously remind yourself of certain aspects you want to change: with time, you will be able to shape your concepts and beliefs.
