Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings - Barry Saferstein

Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings - Barry Saferstein

4. Process Narratives and Models of Cognition

Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings - Barry Saferstein

Barry Saferstein [+-]
California State University, San Marcos
Professor Barry Saferstein is a cognitive sociologist whose research interests include the effects of multimedia health information technology on clinical interaction; explanations and understandings of genetics and medical information in schools, science centres, and clinics; the application of digital technologies to qualitative research methods; and the construction of ideology through mediated and face-to-face interaction. His recent work examines how professional authority affects the development of understandings. He has also published studies of agenda setting activities and the interactional construction of ideology in television production settings.

Description

Chapter Four examines the differences between process narratives and mental models. Unlike approaches to memory and understanding that emphasize operations of reasoning within the mind, the process narrative approach accounts for both the material and mental components of understandings. Rather than focusing on the artifacts, such as stories that result from interpretation activities, it emphasizes the enduring linkage of information, interpretation activities, resources in settings, culturally influenced patterns of expression, and frames of reference. In that regard, the clinical and classroom data analysis shows how the creation and expansion of mental models or schemata take place. This chapter examines information constraints in the production of understandings and beliefs, comparing process narratives to Schank and Abelson’s story approach to memory, and reconsidering categories of mental operations, including functional fixedness, oracular reasoning, Rumelhart and Norman’s typology of learning (accretion, tuning, and restructuring), and D’Andrade’s discussion of the role of contentful sense of contingency in solving logic problems.

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Citation

Saferstein, Barry . 4. Process Narratives and Models of Cognition. Understanding and Interaction in Clinical and Educational Settings. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 115-128 Nov 2016. ISBN 9781845534363. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=27836. Date accessed: 09 Dec 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.27836. Nov 2016

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