Situational systematicity: A role for schema in understanding the differences between abstract and concrete concepts

Abstract

concepts differ from concrete concepts in a number of ways. Here, we focus on what we refer to as situational systematicity: The objects and relations that constitute an abstract concept (e.g., justice) are more dispersed through space and time than are the objects and relations that typically constitute a concrete concept (e.g., chair); a larger set of objects and relations might potentially constitute an abstract concept than a concrete one; and exactly which objects and relations constitute a concept is likely more context-dependent for abstract than for concrete concepts. We thus refer to abstract concepts as having low situational systematicity. We contend that situational systematicity, rather than abstractness per se, may be a critical determinant of the cognitive, behavioral, and neural phenomena typically associated with concepts. We also contend that investigating concepts through the lens of schema provides insight into the situation-based dynamics of concept learning and representation, and into the functional significance of the interactions between brain regions that make up the schema control network.

Words have a weight: language as a source of inner grounding and flexibility in abstract concepts

“…Words that have high semantic diversity irrespective of imageability take longer to process in semantic relatedness tasks (Hoffman & Woollams, 2015). Abstract concepts also exhibit less situational systematicity than concrete concepts -that is, they are less constrained with respect to the situations that they involve or invoke (Davis, Altmann, & Yee, 2020). Both of these measures fit well with theories of concepts that view them as schemas capturing information about how objects and events interact within real-world situations (Barsalou, Dutriaux & Scheepers, 2018;Gilboa & Marlatte, 2017).…”

Differential Influence of Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Lesions on Neural Representations of Schema and Semantic Category Knowledge

“…In this study, we asked whether the vMPFC-mediated precue reinstatement and postcue instantiation apply only to schemas, or whether similar processes might also support category processing. In a model proposed in Davis, Altmann, and Yee (2020), conceptual knowledge occupies a continuum of situational systematicity. By this account, schemas are considered to be more abstract and categories more concrete because (i) the objects and relations contained in an abstract concept are less consistent across space and time, (ii) there are more objects and relations in abstract concepts, and (iii) the appropriate objects and relations comprising an abstract concept are more context-dependent.…”

Language as a mental travel guide

“…The emergence of increasingly abstract representations (not just in language) may rely on domain-general neurobiological mechanisms for tracking systematicities across space and time (for discussion of how one such mechanism may apply to abstract concepts, see Davis et al 2020). However, a problem for any experience-based model of abstraction is how we sample enough of the world to track those systematicities and converge on shared meaning.…”