Understanding Psychology (10th Ed)

concepts
A mental grouping of similar 
objects, events, or people.
prototypes
Typical, highly representa-
tive examples of a concept.
Many athletes use mental imagery to 
focus on a task, a process they call 
“getting in the zone.” What are some 
other occupations that require the use 
of strong mental imagery?
How do you view these structures? Whether you categorize them as two houses of worship 
(left and middle), as two similar examples of architecture (middle and right) or simply as three 
buildings, you are using concepts.
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246 Chapter 
8 
Cognition and Language
birds, the robin is an example that comes to most people’s minds far more readily. 
Consequently, robin is a prototype of the concept “bird.” Similarly, when we think 
of the concept of a table, we’re likely to think of a coffee table before we think of a 
drafting table, making a coffee table closer to our prototype of a table. See Figure 2.
Relatively high agreement exists among people in a particular culture about which 
examples of a concept are prototypes as well as which examples are not. For instance, 
most people in Western cultures consider cars and trucks good examples of vehicles, 
whereas elevators and wheelbarrows are not considered very good examples. Conse-
quently, cars and trucks are prototypes of the concept of a vehicle (see Figure 3). 
Concepts enable us to think about and understand more readily the complex 
world in which we live. For example, the suppositions we make about the reasons 
for other people’s behavior are based on the ways in which we classify behavior. 
Hence, our conclusion about a person who washes her hands 20 times a day could 
vary, depending on whether we place her behavior within the conceptual framework 
of a health-care worker or a mental patient. Similarly, physicians make diagnoses by 
drawing on concepts and prototypes of symptoms that they learned about in medi-
cal school. Finally, concepts and prototypes facilitate our efforts to draw suitable 
conclusions through the cognitive process we turn to next: reasoning.