User:Phil-B

=Mental Models=

Introduction
Mental models are often regarded as being representations within a particular individual's mind of the experiences to which that human-being has been exposed during his/her life-time. The creation of these models starts at an early age and continues throughout a person's life. These models play an important role in relation to the nature of both the cognitive and the physical behaviour that an individual displays or exhibits.

Richard Hamilton (ESL-170, 2010) has given a useful definition of the term mental model:


 * Internal explanations for how specific systems work in the real world. They consists of our beliefs about the nature of events, domains, concepts that approximate the actual system and which allow us to make predictions about related events and systems, etc. The model can consists of images, diagrams, propositions, scripts, schemata that capture the nature of the events, etc.

A mental model is an example of a composite cognitive structure that is built by combining simpler cognitive structures such as plans, lists, procedures, and so on. The process of model-building is an inherent, usually unconscious, mental activity that forms a primary basis for human existance.

Figure 1 shows the relationship between the role of mental models and some of the important factors that influence their creation and ongoing adaptation.

>>>>> Figure 1 goes here <<<<<<<<<

More material to come later ....