Working models process signals against the structure and content of your mental maps – for you to act. It’s the difference between having a mall map in front of you, or a city map in your hand, and moving. You use information from the map to make your way from a current location to your destination. I call it a working model because it’s provisional. It can and should change as you update your mental map with new information.
I’ll use working model when talking about active processing – the map being run against incoming signals, generating felt experience, producing responses. I’ll use mental map when talking about content and structure – what someone has encoded about a person or situation, where it came from, what it contains.
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