- Unfamiliar concepts, conventions, formats, terminology, and symbols may not be understood. But, if they are eventually understood, it’ll require effortful processing (which is only going to occurred if the individual is highly motivated to understand the concept).
- If unfamiliar concepts, symbols, etc. are absolutely necessary to convey a message, they need to be explicitly introduced and explained. These explanations are more effective if they draw on information that’s familiar to the audience. 


The Principle of Appropriate Knowledge’s Corollaries

The P.A.K. states that communication requires prior knowledge of relevant concepts, jargon, and symbols. If a presenter relies on terminology that the audience isn’t familiar with, the audience will fail to understand and retain information. 

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Task analysis leads us to posit a third class of relevant processes. Encoding information and integrating it appropriately wouldn’t be useful if the meaning of the material wasn’t understood. In order to create meaning from the stimuli, it must be compared to previously stored information in the long-term memory. Through retrieval, we can comprehend the imported information. The follow three principles address accessing long-term memory, and relevant stored information: Appropriate Knowledge, Compatibility, and Relevance.

Accessing Long-Term Memory

Kosslyn, S. M., Kievit, R. A., Russell, A. G., & Shephard, J. M. (2012, July 17). PowerPoint® Presentation Flaws and failures: A psychological analysis. Frontiers. Retrieved September 22, 2022, from https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00230/full 

PowerPoint® Presentation Flaws and Failures: A Psychological Analysis

The Principle of Appropriate Knowledge 

The P.C. states that a message is easiest to understand if its form is compatible with its meaning. This principle is most commonly seen through the “Stroop Effect”. 

The Principle of Compatibility 

The P.R. states that communication is done most effectively when neither too much, nor too little information is presented. It entails the search for a balance of the two. 

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