Overview
This time the topic word is schema. 'Huh? What is that? But… it's a term I hear often. I didn't really know the specifics.' So I asked Sangjun for a brief explanation. While listening, mental model suddenly came to mind, and with the question 'why do I keep confusing these?' I decided to look up both.
Schema is an English word pointing to a rough plan or transcendental schema, and it is a philosophical term originating from Kantian philosophy. (source: Wikipedia)
Note) Examples of similar usage
Scheme refers to something concrete and fixed.
Database schema is a computing term defining the structure of data, how data is represented, and relationships between data items.
XML schema is a specification that defines the content, structure, and format of XML documents, written itself in XML.
Mental model is
A mental model is an explanation of someone's thought process about how something works in the real world. It is a representation of the surrounding world, the relationships between its various parts and a person's intuitive perception about his or her own acts and their consequences. Mental models can help shape behaviour and set an approach to solving problems (akin to a personal algorithm) and doing tasks.
A mental model is one kind of explanation — the process of someone thinking (about how something works in the real world). It is a mode of representation — of the surrounding world, or of the relationships between its various parts and one person's intuitive perception (of their own actions and their consequences). A mental model can help —shape behaviour and set an approach (to problem solving (akin to a personal algorithm)) and carrying out tasks.
Jay Wright Forrester defined general mental models as:
"The image of the world around us, which we carry in our head, is just a model. Nobody in his head imagines all the world, government or country. He has only selected concepts, and relationships between them, and uses those to represent the real system."
That image is the world around us. (this image we carry in our head)
It is just one model.
No one imagines the whole thing inside their head. (the entire world, government or country)
What he did was merely select — concepts, and the relationships between them, and used them to represent the real system.
(source: Wikipedia)
" A side note — the Korean Wikipedia has no entry for it. Suddenly I thought, 'Huh? There's no wiki (term definition) for mental model, so how is everyone out there explaining user experience and interaction design with it…? Is it assumed that of course everyone already knows?' One Korean blog briefly defined it as 'a term that conveniently, in a roundabout way, describes what a user is thinking.' (source: STUDY UX)
