Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Concepts and Prototypes

Concepts and Prototypes

The human nervous system handles vast amounts of information by translating sensory stimuli into neural impulses, which the brain processes, creating thoughts expressed through language or stored as memories. The brain also synthesizes information from emotions and memories, which significantly influence thoughts and behaviors. This intricate process creates a comprehensive mental picture.
The brain organizes this information using concepts, which are mental categories grouping linguistic data,...

Stereotype Content Model

Stereotype Content Model

The Stereotype Content Model (SCM) was first proposed by Susan Fiske and her colleagues (Fiske, Cuddy, Glick & Xu, 2002; see also Fiske, 2012 and Fiske, 2017). The SCM specifies that when someone encounters a new group, they will stereotype them based on two metrics: warmth—or that group’s perceived intent, and how likely they are to provide help or inflict harm—and competence—or their ability to carry out that objective. Depending on the warmth-competence categorization, a person will feel...

Natural and Artificial Concepts

Natural and Artificial Concepts

In psychology, concepts can be divided into two categories: natural and artificial. Natural concepts are formed through direct or indirect experiences. For example, consider the concept of snow. If you live in a place with regular snowfall, such as Essex Junction, Vermont, you know snow through direct experiences. You’ve seen it fall, touched it, shoveled it, and played in it. You recognize its texture, appearance, and even its smell. In contrast, if you live on an island like Saint Vincent in...

Trait Centrality

Trait Centrality

Trait centrality refers to the degree to which a particular characteristic influences the overall impression of an individual. Some traits exert a disproportionately strong impact on perception, shaping how people interpret other attributes of a person. Solomon Asch first systematically studied this phenomenon in 1946.Asch’s Experiment on Trait CentralityAsch's seminal study demonstrated the centrality of certain traits through a controlled experiment. Participants were presented with a list of...

The Representativeness Heuristic

The Representativeness Heuristic

The representative heuristic describes a biased way of thinking, in which you unintentionally stereotype someone or something. For example, you may assume that your professors spend their free time reading books and engaging in intellectual conversation, because the idea of them spending their time playing volleyball or visiting an amusement park does not fit in with your stereotypes of professors.

Trait Theory by Gordon Allport

Trait Theory by Gordon Allport

Gordon Allport, often regarded as the father of American personality psychology, developed a theory that emphasized the importance of understanding people in their present lives rather than focusing on their past, as psychoanalysis did. Allport believed that personality should be studied in healthy, well-adjusted individuals rather than those with psychological problems. He was particularly interested in defining traits, which he saw as fundamental mental structures that guide behavior across...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

A systematic review of stress reduction interventions among graduate students.

Journal of American college health : J of ACH·2025

Same author

The spacing effect in remote information-integration category learning.

Memory & cognition·2024

Same author

Predicting attitudinal and behavioral responses to COVID-19 pandemic using machine learning.

PNAS nexus·2022

Same author

Psychedelic Experiences and Mindfulness are Associated with Improved Wellbeing.

Journal of psychoactive drugs·2022

Same author

Author Correction: National identity predicts public health support during a global pandemic.

Nature communications·2022

Same author

National identity predicts public health support during a global pandemic.

Nature communications·2022

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jul 15, 2026

Foreign Accent and Forensic Speaker Identification in Voice Lineups: The Influence of Acoustic Features Based on Prosody

Foreign Accent and Forensic Speaker Identification in Voice Lineups: The Influence of Acoustic Features Based on Prosody

Published on: September 27, 2024

Extracting prototypes from lexical feature norms for settlement concepts.

Chelsea-Leigh M McKenzie¹, John Paul Minda²

¹Department of Psychology, Western University, London, ON, N6A 3K7, Canada. cmcken7@uwo.ca.

Memory & Cognition

|July 14, 2026

Summary

People share a collective understanding of settlement concepts, revealing prototypes and family resemblance. However, regional context influences these concepts, showing geographical variations in prototypical features.

Keywords:

Concepts Family resemblance Prototypes Semantic memory Settlements

More Related Videos

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential (ERP) Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential (ERP) Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Published on: April 12, 2018

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jul 15, 2026

Foreign Accent and Forensic Speaker Identification in Voice Lineups: The Influence of Acoustic Features Based on Prosody

Foreign Accent and Forensic Speaker Identification in Voice Lineups: The Influence of Acoustic Features Based on Prosody

Published on: September 27, 2024

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential (ERP) Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential (ERP) Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Published on: April 12, 2018

Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Social Psychology
Urban Studies

Background:

Understanding how individuals conceptualize settlements is crucial for urban planning and social sciences.
Previous research has not extensively explored shared conceptual structures of settlements.
Investigating individual variation versus collective understanding of settlement types is needed.

Purpose of the Study:

To determine if a common understanding of settlement concepts exists across individuals.
To identify featural prototypes and the overall structure of settlement concepts.
To examine the influence of regional context (USA vs. Canada) on settlement conceptualization.

Main Methods:

Participants generated features for 57 settlement concepts (e.g., city, college town) in a property listing task.
Hierarchical cluster analysis was employed to group settlements based on shared features.
A subset of participants from Canada and the USA were analyzed to assess regional effects.

Main Results:

A family resemblance structure and featural prototypes for settlement concepts were identified.
Prototypical features of settlements differed between participants from the USA and Canada.
Geographical region significantly impacts the conceptual structure of settlements.

Conclusions:

This study provides the first investigation into the conceptual representation of settlements.
Semantic feature norms are valuable for understanding collective thought about living environments.
Regional context plays a significant role in shaping how people represent settlements.