SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS THEORY*

The term of social representations refers to the products and processes characterizing "common sense" thinking - practical reasoning set through a social intercourse with its own style and logics, distributed and shared equally among members of a same social or cultural group. Since the second half of the 20th century, this "common sense" has acquired a significant position among social science studies, under the convergence of new thinking trends in anthropology, history, psychology, psychoanalysis, sociology and more recently in cognitive sciences, philosophy of linguistics and philosophy of thought.

The study of social representations was first proposed in the field of social psychology by Moscovici. The objective is to understand how "common sense" thinking put into practice in daily experiences. In his main book La Psychanalyse, son image et son public, 1961, a work on social knowledge, studying the how of sciences and common sense are intricate, Moscovici explored out again the Durkheim concept that was almost forgotten, i.e. a collective representation concept, which he called social representations. The aim of this name changing is to differentiate common sense within the environment of contemporary communities, which compared to traditional communities, contemporary communities are strongly characterized by a diversity of ideas, changes, social mobility, individualization of social actors confronted to the pressures of social environment, the dissemination of sciences in everyday life and the role of modern communication.

From representation to social representations

Whatever the form (mental occurrence, oral expression, picture, sound) representations always has symbolical characteristics because it functions as replacement of an entity (the object) which is an element whether from material world, world of occurrences, human world, social world, world of ideas or world of imaginaries. In social sciences, the concept of representations benefits nowadays from a multi-disciplinary status with various practices.

The tradition of philosophy and psychoanalysis differentiates representations as an activity of thought and representations as fruits of the activity. Social sciences tend to discuss the finished products, i.e. "social mental products" (Durkheim), which are studied from both the perspective of its form (systems of belief, ideologies, local knowledge, and social and human theories) and the perspective of its function in social life: for example anthropology focuses on its role as a constitutive element or producer of social relationships, as a foundation of particularization of social order (Augé, Godelier); sociology sees representation as a social transformation factor and source of politic and religious behaviors (Bourdieu, Maître, Michelat & Simon); history sees it as a favorite object for the study of mentalities and reactions (Chartier, Corbin), which bridges material organization and systems of ideology (Duby) and for practical thinking, the instauration of social ties and symbolization of identity (Lepetit). On the other hand cognitive sciences study the process of cognitive activities which, through information processing (especially perceptive information), result in inter-individual mental representation. The "social" dimensions only involve cognitive activities as found in association with specific social objects like individuals, groups, social relations.

The psychological approach on social representations combines the two views above, because it explains both the process and the content of knowledge by referring to both the social condition and context where this knowledge is produced and communicated and at the final objectives that would be achieved in connection with material environment, human environment and symbolical environment. Social representations reproduces its object while transforming it under the influence of various psychological factors (relevant to cognitive or psychological processes) and social factors (related to communication, inter-subjectivity, social belonging, social system contextualized in time and space). This view also considers affective and emotional elements which affect the formulation of the contents of thoughts - therefore psychoanalysis is also involved with the placement of representation in psychological and inter-subjectivity processes (Green).

Social representations theory

Formulated by Moscovici, this theory has several objectives: learning the relations between common sense knowledge and scientific knowledge; understanding the generative processes of social thinking; reveal social representations functions both in association with the familiarization of novelty and explanation of human experiences as well as in directing of behaviors and communications within social dynamics.

The main paradigm has identified two major processes in the creation of social representations: first, objectification which operate the intervention both from the elements of social framework (norms, values, codes etc, which take part as meta-system that arranges cognitive processes) and from the communication pressures in the selection and organization of representation elements; and second, anchoring that is held responsible for the integration of new information to the systems of knowledge and meaning that have been present before.

These processes also bring forward the way these elements are included again in mental activities, as working instrument, to interpret social world situation and how the interpretation is used in inter-individual interaction.

This paradigm also provides various conceptual instruments for analysis of social representations as finished products, i.e., contents of representations (as ideas, imaginary products or symbols), also as seen in the forms of the representations itself (individual products or collective products, which are discursive, iconic or material and practical), and/or how the form of its circulation is generated within the community through various means of communication (conversation, media, institution).

Three dimensions can be identified in the above contents (information, attitude and field of representation that cover image, expressions of values, beliefs and opinions etc). In the case where the formation of content is linked to direct social communication, three factors (dispersion and information gaps, the pressure for inference, interest and involvement of the speaker) will affect the cognitive aspects of representations and differentiate natural thinking in its patterns of reasoning, logics and styles. If involving media communication, the efforts to draw public attention will also affect differently the construction of attitude: type of diffusion that inducts opinions, the spreads belief and results in propaganda of stereotypes.

Further developments of Moscovici's theory have underlined differentiation amongst types of thinking (magic, scientific, ideological); the role of thêmata, binary stable structures that consolidate the formation of new representations; subjective foundation of social representations and the way the representations are performed when it's strongly ingrained within the cultural history in the form of beliefs.

Psycho-sociological model of social representations

Based on the above theory, several models of interpretation have been diversified according to the following perspectives: genetic, structural or dynamic, which are completed with the methodology of specific qualitative and quantitative approach.

The genetic point of view underlines the condition of emergence and transformation of social representation, connecting their contents and organizations as structured fields to the social conditions of their production and to the modus of social communication.

The structural approach describes the contents as elements consisting of both central and peripheral components-where central components are functioning as the significant creator for the whole representations as well as unifying, furthermore stabilizing the peripheral components; aside from that, the structural point of view studies the logical aspect of the system.

The dynamic point of view assumes the presence of a shared common framework in communication and symbolic interaction system, and explains the presence of variations in individual attitudes by the intervention of social representations, intervening as regulating principles. Another aspect of the dynamics of social representations has been associated with their dialogical character linked to social communication.

Criticism and developments

Despite its central position in social sciences, the notions of representation and of social representation have been criticized because they are regarded too realist; because the question of "mentalist" models are questioned; and because of the dominance they give to the discursive elements. Such criticism do not affect much the future of social representations study, which provides languages and communication a decisive role in the construction of representations, which basically are the foundation of social construction of reality. There are little impacts towards the production of this field of study, which is often put to the front internationally, judging from the number of involved publications (more than 3,000 in several languages).

*Translated from Le Dictionnaire des Sciences Humaines, Paris, PUF, 2006, « Representation Sociales » written by Denise Jodelet

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