Cognitive schemas: this is how our thinking is organized

The concept of cognitive schema is one of the most important of those used in current psychology, regardless of whether it is in intervention and therapy or in research. Thanks to it, it is possible to create theories about different behavior patterns, biases and prejudices, and types of beliefs that define each person.

In a way, each of us we have our cognitive schema system, and these are expressed from what we say and do. They are part of our identity and the way in which we have become accustomed to "reading" reality.

In this article we will see what exactly cognitive schemas are and how they affect our way of thinking, whether consciously or unconsciously.

• Related article: "The 10 types of beliefs, and how they talk about who we are"

What are cognitive schemas?

Part of our identity is based on the way in which we mentally organize all those concepts, beliefs and learning that we use to live day to day. In fact, if the human mind is so complex and fascinating, it is among other things because it can find an almost infinite amount of

ways to generate interpretations about reality, each one of them having a relative internal coherence.

However, it is difficult for the same person to maintain many well-differentiated behavior patterns at the same time. In practice, in fact, this would indicate that there is no style of behavior, but that what defines the actions of that individual is purely chaos, the unpredictable. Reality, on the other hand, tells us that our way of being follows relatively stable guidelines. Whoever avoids talking to strangers is very likely not to happen overnight to seek to be the center of attention, for example.

Our way of interpreting the world, our identity and social relationships is not random and constantly changing, rather, it follows certain patterns that give it stability over time and in the different contexts we go through.

However... What is behind these "rails" that seem to guide our behavior? Part of that "psychological structure" that gives stability to what we do is derived precisely from what we think.

Normally we do not act in a way that goes against our beliefs, unless we are forced to do so. And they are the cognitive schemes, they are precisely the designs of that circuit through which our thoughts and opinions usually go.

Moving from one concept to another: a system of thought

In short, cognitive schemas are systems of relationships between concepts that make it more likely to move from certain ideas to others. For example, if for us the concept of consuming animal meat is related to the concept of "bad", it is difficult for us to think about the concept of "art" when we see a bullfighting show.

Another example would be someone who fervently believes in the Christian god. For this person, it is easy for him to see the hand of an engineer behind the design of the elements that he finds in nature. Therefore, the concept "nature" will be related to a concept that defines only one part of what exists, and not all, so you will believe that there is something beyond matter: the divinity of him.

For an atheist, on the other hand, the concept of "nature" is much more likely to be related to equivalence with the concept of "what exists", since for him there is nothing but matter in movement.

To end, someone who has a very low self-esteemhe will probably have trouble combining his selfconcept with the idea of ​​"success". That is why he will learn an attribution style whereby he will interpret his achievements to be actually a simple fruit of luck, something that could have happened to anyone. On the other hand, it will also be more possible for him to interpret the misfortunes that happen to him as if they were his guilt, reaching cases in which he is responsible for the aggressions and attacks others; This is something that is seen a lot in victims of abuse.

Thus, cognitive schemas make Let's go from concept A to B more easily than from A to G, and in this way "networks" of strongly interconnected concepts are generated that maintain a certain coherence.

Cognitive dissonance

The fact that we live interpreting things through cognitive schemes has positive aspects, but there are also negative ones. For example, these psychological schemas endow our mental processes with a certain rigidity. This, in the best of cases, can lead to a certain difficulty in understanding the perspective of others. people, or possibly to carry out creative tasks (researching creativity is complicated); and at worst, it leads to dogmatism.

However, there is another phenomenon that is also a consequence of the robustness of cognitive schemas: cognitive dissonance, a phenomenon by which we feel discomfort when holding two ideas that are contradictory to each other.

These are pros and cons that you have to know how to manage, since it is not possible to do without cognitive schemes. What we can do is try to make them more useful than problematic. In fact, cognitive therapy, based on the ideas of Aron Beck, is based on that principle: modify beliefs to make them serve us, and not us.