Mental+Model

**Mental Model**
A mental model is a representation in the mind of real or imaginary situations. This idea of where people rely on mental models can be traced back to Kenneth Craik's book "The Nature of Explanation" in 1943 where he suggested that the mind can make small scale models of reality to anticipate future events. They can be made up of perception, imagination and visual images but they can also be abstract and show situations that can not be visualized which means each model represents a "possibility".

In interaction design, mental models are representations of systems of environments based on real experience, and are commonly characterized into two types: //system models// which capture how things work and //interaction models// which capture how people interact with systems. When designers harness these two models with accuracy and completeness, they can implement them into their work and produce optimal design (Lidwell, 2003:130).

References: 1.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_model 2.http://www.lauradove.info/reports/mental%20models.htm Depaul University, Cognative Psychology 404 ,November 15, 1999, Mary Jo Davidson, Laura Dove, Julie Weltz 3. Lidwell, William et al. //Universal Principles of Design//. Rockport Publishers: Massachussets, 2003.