…dynamic analog representations of spatial relations and movements in space…
Jean M. Mandler
With several different definitions and perspectives, image schemas are mental abstractions that function as conceptual building blocks for thought.
They are learned in early infancy as children experience their environment and extract reoccurring patterns from the spatiotemporal relationships between objects, agents and spaces.
They can be found in natural language expressions, in abstract and metaphoric reasoning and have become increasingly important for commonsense reasoning of artificial agents.