Mental Models

1. Mental Models Presented by Bryan Downer & Elaine Garcia

2. Objectives: • For you to experience what mental models are. • To learn more about the discipline of mental models • Our awareness of how they affect our assumptions and actions.

3. Mental Models Look for characteristics about the community Economics Environmental Aspects

4. Watch:

5. What were some of your own mental models about the clip? Mental Models Characteristics

6. Mental Models – What are they? • Mental models are the images (attitudes and assumptions) we carry in our minds about ourselves, other people, institutions, and every aspect of the world which guide our interpretations and behavior. • Like a pane of glass which restricts or distorts our vision, our mental models determine what we see. • Typically exist below the level of awareness • We tend to be attracted to, and take in, only the information that reinforces our mental models. P. Senge

7. Identify MMs of the characters:

8. The Ladder of Inference We operate on self-generating beliefs based on conclusions inferred from what we observe, plus our past experience. Senge refers to this as climbing up a mental “ladder of inference” – a common mental pathway of increasing abstraction, often leading to misguided beliefs. The only observable data is the action at the bottom of the ladder and your decision to take action at the top. However, traveling up the rungs of the ladder takes place in your head – unseen and unquestioned assumptions and conclusions, perhaps considered unfit for discussion. These leaps up the ladder are sometimes called “leaps of abstraction.”

9. The Ladder of InferenceLeaps of abstraction based on our mental models Traveling up the Ladder of Inference José will never change. He will always misbehave and needs to be suspended. José is a bad student and he will be a problem for me. José was transferred to our school because he misbehaves a lot The previous school couldn’t handle José. José gets in trouble and suspended a lot. José has multiple referrals in his cum. José transferred from a neighboring school.

10. The Effect of Mental Models information does not get through mental model some info. gets through, but is changed only info. that fits “familiar ways of thinking & acting” gets through unchanged

11. Working with Mental Models “The discipline of mental models starts with turning the mirror inward; learning to unearth our internal pictures of the world, to bring them to the surface and hold them rigorously to scrutiny. It also includes the ability to carry on ‘learningful’ conversations that balance inquiry and advocacy, where people expose their own thinking effectively and make that thinking open to the influence of others.” Senge, P. 1990. The Fifth Discipline. The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization.

12. Protocols for Improved Inquiry

13. Protocols for Improved Advocacy

14. (continued)

15. Awareness of Mental Models Senge explains that we cannot possibly process equally and accurately all of the reality that is around us. By necessity we have to operate according to mental models in order to concentrate our efforts. However, mental models are limiting. They limit because they require assumptions. Assumptions are not data, but rather are inferred from data. Therefore, they are subject to error. Senge is not recommending that we get rid of our mental models, but is strongly suggesting that we remain aware of them. That awareness keeps us open to new data and continuous mental model revision.