How do we perceive the world? When we hear “potato,” how do hundreds of different concepts, ranging from fried potatoes to restaurants, knives, and farming, emerge in our minds? How can we predict whether we will like a movie based on its poster, description, and the likes it has received?
Schemas
By the wise nature of creation, our heart, mind, intellect, and memory categorize our experiences and feelings from the moment we are born. Every moment we live, everything we see and hear, every piece of knowledge we acquire, is added to a schema in our mind for later use. An airplane schema includes various elements like travel, vehicle, passport, seat belt, ticket, whereas concepts like ducks or hospitals do not belong to this schema, and we know they won’t be on the airplane. Behavioral schemas shape our actions by turning necessary behaviors into a mental map. Routine actions like taking a seat in class, listening to the teacher, and remaining quiet become part of the classroom schema, turning into behaviors we perform without conscious thought.
Throughout our lives, as these schemas grow and develop, we become so skilled at using them that arriving at certain conclusions becomes automatic.[1] For instance, if we have read biographies and not enjoyed them, when we see a book of that genre, we place it in the same category as previous ones and predict that we won’t like it. This speeds up the process of choosing a book of interest from hundreds of options.
Schemas also play a crucial role in our vision. Our brain, after receiving two-dimensional images on our retinas, helps us perceive objects in three dimensions by estimating their shadows and other items based on their sizes. In fact, our perceptions take place in our conscious soul, which has the ability to assign meaning to everything and is created in our heart. The eye is a window, the brain an interface. It is the seeing soul.
In the process of perception, our mind and intellect compare a new object or event with previous schemas. Illusions also work based on this principle. While our mind predicts what should be based on observations, illusions surprise us by presenting the opposite.
Our memory contains schemas specific to individuals. Based on our experiences, these schemas are quickly and comprehensively constructed using the characteristics of the people we encounter, allowing us to instantly categorize every person we meet. In the evening, if we see dark, differently dressed individuals in a dim alley, our schema of people to avoid immediately activates, leading us to redirect to another street.
Through a process known as “top-down,” our mind categorizes people through a process that first focuses on the whole and then on the parts. Thus, our brain places the people we meet into a schema based on our initial impressions, shaping our reactions and behaviors toward them. As we acquire new information, these schemas develop, grow, and become more specialized. These schemas may remain similar to our initial impressions or take on a significantly different form.
Schemas that facilitate communication with people we meet for the first time can also lead to biases. Generalizations may hold true for the majority, but they don’t apply to everyone. Shaping our ideas about people through generalizations is akin to looking at the whole picture and ignoring its parts. Insisting on judging those around us without changing our impressions is a kind of ‘ignoring the obvious.’ “Sometimes, a person cannot adjust their perspective, sometimes due to certain predispositions and prejudices, they may not be able to see and appreciate the invaluable values right beside them. In fact, they might become a harsh and merciless adversary to those values. If you wish, you can call this ‘ignoring the obvious.’”[2] Above all, isn’t it our duty to contemplate, to think beyond appearances, and to strive to rid ourselves of prejudices?
The ability to use schemas has been bestowed upon us as both a key to assist us in challenging situations and a shortcut to ease our daily lives. Our All-Knowing Creator instructs us in these instances. Our thoughts take shape based on our intentions and perspectives. In this regard, recognizing what our thought schemas are built upon can be an important step towards making positive decisions.
[1] David E. Rumelhart, “Schemata: The Building Blocks of Cognition”, Theoretical Issues in Reading Comprehension (Theoretical Issues in Reading Comprehension ed.), Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1980, s. 33–58.
[2] M. Fethullah Gülen, Yolun Kaderi (Kırık Testi-15), İstanbul: Nil Yayınları, 2016, s. 166.
