Concept Mapping in 5 Easy Steps
WHOLE STUDENT
LEARNING SERIES
ACADEMIC AND CAREER GUIDANCE
MSUCOM
INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES
•  After this presentation a medical student will
•  Appreciate the potential benefits of concept mapping to
her or his medical education.
•  Be able to create a basic concept map to work through a
course learning objective, question, or problem s/he is trying
to learn, answer, or solve.
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WHAT IS CONCEPT MAPPING?
•  “Concept maps are graphical tools for organizing
and representing knowledge” (Cañas, 2009).
•  Concept mapping is an ideal technique for
organizing and thinking about complex information
and ill-structured medical problems.
•  Medical students can effectively use concept
mapping as a study method while striving to
assimilate vast amounts of medical knowledge for
the ultimate purpose of being able to make an
accurate diagnosis of a patient’s medical problem.
•  All types of learners can potentially benefit from
concept mapping to help think through complex
problems or as a method of creating review/
summary sheets for course exams or boards.
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WHAT ARE THE BASIC STEPS TO
CREATING A CONCEPT MAP?
1. 
2. 
3. 
4. 
5. 
Begin with a “focus question” or problem, such as “how to diagnose chest
pain?” or “how do antibiotics work?”
Brainstorm and create a “parking lot” of 15-30 key concepts that relate to
the focus question. Try to list these in an approximate rank-order from most
general to most specific.
On a sheet of unlined paper*, write the main concept near the top or
middle of the paper, and construct a preliminary map by moving the
concepts from the parking lot into the map in a hierarchical fashion (from
general to specific).
Connect the concepts with arrows and identify the relationships between
the concepts using “linking words” or “linking phrases.”
Evaluate the map and revise as needed to flesh out the details: Do the
pieces fit together and make sense? Have you included everything
pertinent? Have you identified all the relationships and interconnections
(cross links)?
*Concept mapping software is available, but even PowerPoint works well because of
the relative ease of creating and manipulating design elements, such as textboxes and
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arrows.
DON’T BE INTIMIDATED*…
•  There is no necessarily right or wrong way to create
a concept map, the important thing is to include
key concepts and attempt to identify as many
relevant relationships as possible.
•  Generally speaking, the more branched and
interconnected the map, the more the sophisticated the
creator’s level of knowledge about the problem (West,
2000).
*The author of this document went to the ER in a full-blown panic attack following
her first introduction to concept-mapping, but it’s really not that difficult! ☺
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What follows is an example of a basic
concept mapping exercise…
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WHAT IS THE FOCUS QUESTION?
•  What is involved in a physician’s ability to provide
an accurate diagnosis to explain a patient’s chief
complaint?
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WHAT ARE THE KEY CONCEPTS?
“PARKING LOT”
•  Phases of diagnosis
•  Information gathering
•  History
•  PE
•  Ancillary tests
•  Integration of information
•  Confirmation of diagnosis
•  Cognitive processes
•  Pattern matching
•  Experts
•  Past experience
•  Illness scripts
•  Mental schema
•  Hypothesis testing
•  Cognitive errors
•  Causes
•  Inadequate information
gathering
•  Inadequate knowledge
•  Cognitive biases
•  Types
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
Wrong synthesis
Inadequate synthesis
Premature closure
Omission
Anchoring
•  Misdiagnosis
•  Medical errors
•  Novice
•  Atypical presentations
(Kuhn, 2002)
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Move concepts from the “parking lot” into
the map maintaining a hierarchical
structure – feel free to play around with
their arrangement / location
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Inadequate
information
gathering
Insufficient
knowledge
Wrong synthesis
Cognitive
biases
Premature closure
Inadequate synthesis
Diagnostic
errors
Wrong / missed
diagnoses
Medical errors
Omission
“Illness scripts”
Anchoring
Volatility
Limited
capacity
Diagnosis
Pattern
matching
Mental
schema
Past
experience
Short-term
memory
Series of phases
Hypothesis
testing
Novices
Information
gathering
Integration
of data
Challenging
cases / atypical
presentations
Experts
Clusters of
related
information
stored in
long-term
memory
Confirmation
History
taking
Physical
exam
Ancillary
tests
Diagnostic
testing
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Add arrows and linking words or
phrases to describe the relationships
between concepts
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Inadequate
information
gathering
Wrong synthesis
Insufficient
knowledge
Limited by
Cognitive
biases
Result from
Premature closure
Inadequate synthesis
Diagnostic
errors
Such as
Omission
Volatility
Due to
Diagnosis
Can
contribute to
Short-term
memory
Series of phases
Can be
limited by
Involves
History
taking
Integration
of data
And
maybe
Physical
exam
Hypothesis
testing
Novices
Information
gathering
Based on
Occurs
by
Pattern
matching
Lead to
Medical errors
“Illness scripts”
A type of
Depends
heavily on
Past
experience
Occurs
by
Involves
Emphasized
more by
Including
Wrong / missed
diagnoses
Is
prone
to
Anchoring
Limited
capacity
Lead to
May
emphasize
Challenging
cases / atypical
presentations
Acquired by
Experts
When
confronted
by
Mental
schema
Which
are
Clusters of
related
information
stored in
long-term
memory
Confirmation
By
Ancillary
tests
If initial
diagnosis
not
confirmed
Diagnostic
testing
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It may take several iterations to get to
an end product you like, but the whole
process, including revision, really helps
you think through the information,
thereby building long-lasting memories
and transferable knowledge!
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
•  Constructing Your First Concept Map
http://cmap.ihmc.us/docs/
ConstructingAConceptMap.html
•  Concept Maps: What the Heck Is This?
https://www.msu.edu/~luckie/ctools/
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REFERENCES
•  Cañas A (2009). What are linking words…from a concept
mapping perspective?” Retrieved from
http://cmap.ihmc.us/docs/linkingwords.html.
•  Kuhn G (2002). Diagnostic errors, Academic Emergency
Medicine, 9(7): 740-750. Accessed on 9/18/14 from
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10.1197/aemj.9.7.740/asset/aemj.
9.7.740.pdf;jsessionid=53C6AB1B3DF2E2E2B5902413FAB3B1B0.f04t03?
v=1&t=i089tbp3&s=b4aefef2937c024577e1462a19e607ccc13c39ee.
•  West DC, Pomeroy JR, Park JK, Gerstenberger EA, and
Sandoval J (2000). Critical thinking in graduate medical
education: A role for concept mapping assessment, JAMA,
284(9): 1105-1110. Accessed on 9/18/14 from
http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=193038.
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