Schema and stereotypes

When you have completed this worksheet you should:

  • Be able to explain what is meant by a schema
  • Know how to show that we use schemas to help us function throughout the day
  • Be aware that you use past schemas to understand new information

Schemas are little packets of knowledge that we hold about the world and help us to interpret what is going on around us. We hold schemas for just about everything. For example, your schema for school or college would lead you to expect to have desks, books, and some form of writing/viewing area for the tutor to be able to show visual aids.

Your schema would also include other students and how to behave with them.

The usefulness of schemas cannot be overstated. They allow us to make calculated judgements about what to expect in any given situation. For example, if you were to see a group of people sitting down on the grass with a cloth laid out on the grass you would immediately think picnic.

Activity

What sort of food would you expect to eat at a picnic? How does this show that you have a schema for picnics?

Schemas not only hep us to make sense of the world we know, but also help us in novel situations. For example, if you were to go to a building that you had never been to before and were required to go up in a lift, your schema for lifts would help you to be able to do this – even though you had never seen this particular lift before.

Activity

Imagine you are at a restaurant and see a diner refuse a dish brought to him, and the waiter takes it away. What would you think of this? Would you think that the customer was complaining that something was wrong with the food? This interpretation is based on your prior knowledge about possible ways of behaving in restaurants, and the likely reasons for, and outcome of, such behaviour.

Schemas are not always helpful however, as sometimes we may fill in the wrong information. For example, if you were to see a robbery and were not quite sure of what the robber was wearing, you may ‘fill in the gap’ in your knowledge by using what stereotypically robbers are thought to wear.

Activity

What would be a stereotypical outfit for a robber? What gender? How does this fit with the idea of schemas?