What is grounding abstractions?

Grounding abstractions is a concept in personal epistemology: Connecting abstract principles to concrete examples makes them usable.

Example: When Joseph Novak introduced concept mapping at Cornell in 1972, he was trying to solve a specific problem: children could recite science definitions but couldn't use them. A student could say 'energy is the capacity to do work' and pass a test, but couldn't explain why a ball rolls downhill or why a pot of water boils. The definitions were floating — abstract propositions disconnected from anything the children had actually experienced. Novak's solution was to have students draw explicit 'exemplifies' links between abstract concepts and concrete instances they had personally encountered. A student who connected 'energy transfer' to 'the warm feeling when I hold a mug of hot chocolate' wasn't just memorizing a definition. She was grounding the abstraction in sensory experience, creating a retrieval path from the abstract back to the concrete. The concept didn't change. The student's ability to use it did — because it was now anchored to something real.

This concept is part of Phase 13 (Relationship Mapping) in the How to Think curriculum, which builds the epistemic infrastructure for relationship mapping.