Transportation Model

Disciplines > Communication > Transportation Model

Description | Example | Discussion | See also

Description

Rather than trying to figure out how people understand, tell them in detail about what you want them to know, seeking to transport all relevant knowledge and understanding from you to them. Approaches include:

Detailed breakdowns and descriptions.
Doing many repeated exercises to hammer home the knowledge.
Reward and recognize only the right answers. Ignore or punish wrong answers.
Give them tests and examinations, with awards and certificates afterwards.

Example

Well, they way I understand it is that these people are not collaborating with us because they have a particular cognitive approach I call 'Lost Thinking'. It works through the double-channel thought process that distracts perceptual appraisal.

Discussion

The Transportation Model uses the principle of 'transplanting' something, taking a whole from one place and inserting it in another without change. It assumes first that to disturb or change the idea being transported in any way will damage and reduce it somehow. It also assume that it is possible to take an idea out of one person's mind and put it in someone else's such that two people will then understand in exactly the same way.

In practice, this is very difficult, as people have different schema and ways of learning. Nevertheless, it is still a very common model in use, not only in everyday communications but also in use by qualified educators.

The Transportation model is useful in imparting fixed knowledge and closely defined skills. It is based on a 'do as I say' master-apprentice principle where it is assumed that the listener is ready to take a subservient role, at least for the duration of the communication.

The Transportation model is also known as the Teaching Model.