Article summary of The social constructionist movement in modern psychology by Gergen - Chapter

In this article the author describes social constructionism. This type of research is about how people describe, explain or otherwise account for the world in which they live. There are different assumptions of this approach, which are described.

1. What we take to be experience of the world does not in itself dictate the terms by which the world is understood. This means that what we understand as knowledge about the world is not a product of induction or of building and testing hypotheses. Questions asked are: “How can theoretical categories map or reflect the world if each definition used to link category and observation itself requires a definition?”, and “How can words map reality when the major constraints over word usage are furnished by linguistic context?”. This is where social constructionist plays a role. It starts with radically doubting the taken-for-granted world. For example, social constructionism invites to think about the objective basis of knowledge. For example, think about gender. Social constructionistic research shows that there are not only two genders.

2. The terms in which the world is understood are social artifacts, products of historically situated interchanges among people. According to constructionists, understanding is not a process driven by nature. Instead, it is the result of an active, cooperative relationship of persons. This invites to look back at history, which has shown there to be a lot of variations in for example the ‘concept of a child’.

3. The degree to which a given form of understanding prevails or is sustained across time is not fundamentally dependent on the empirical validity of the perspective in question, but on varieties of social processes. For example, whether an act is defined as envy, flirtation or anger depends on social circumstances.

4. Forms of negotiated understanding are of critical significance in social life and they are integrally connected with other activities in which people engage. For example, when someone asks you: “Hello, how are you?”, this utterance is often accompanied by certain facial expressions, bodily postures, and movements. Similarly, descriptions and explanations are integral parts of social patterns.

How is social constructionism viewed from a historical perspective?

It can be helpful to look at constructionism in two different traditions which are distinguished in terms of basic epistemological orientations or models of knowledge. The first tradition is the exogenic perspective, which views knowledge as directly resulting from the world. In contrast, the endogenic perspective views knowledge as being dependent on processes. In the past two decades, there was a big reversal in emphasis. Whereas previously the exogenic perspective was dominant, the endogenic perspective made a return. There was thus an evolution in social psychology, which was driven by Kurt Lewin. However, this perspective has not fully developed yet. Explanations for how cognitions are built up from experience are still lacking. Also, the Cartesian mind-body problem remains unsolved. Thus, the goal for social constructionism should be to develop a new framework of analysis based on a non-empiricist theory.

What are the implications of social constructionism for psychology and science?

With regard to psychology, the implications of social constructionism are large. However, it will experience strong resistance within psychology, because it poses a challenge to traditional knowledge claims. For social constructionist, the development of a metatheory should be of high priority. This means that the locus of scientific rationality should not lie within the minds of individuals, but within the social aggregate. This would also mean that new theoretical tools are required. In addition, the functions of language should be elaborated on.

BulletPoints

• It can be helpful to look at constructionism in two different traditions which are distinguished in terms of basic epistemological orientations or models of knowledge. The first tradition is the exogenic perspective, which views knowledge as directly resulting from the world. In contrast, the endogenic perspective views knowledge as being dependent on processes. In the past two decades, there was a big reversal in emphasis. Whereas previously the exogenic perspective was dominant, the endogenic perspective made a return. There was thus an evolution in social psychology, which was driven by Kurt Lewin. However, this perspective has not fully developed yet. Explanations for how cognitions are built up from experience are still lacking. Also, the Cartesian mind-body problem remains unsolved. Thus, the goal for social constructionism should be to develop a new framework of analysis based on a non-empiricist theory.

• With regard to psychology, the implications of social constructionism are large. However, it will experience strong resistance within psychology, because it poses a challenge to traditional knowledge claims. For social constructionist, the development of a metatheory should be of high priority. This means that the locus of scientific rationality should not lie within the minds of individuals, but within the social aggregate. This would also mean that new theoretical tools are required. In addition, the functions of language should be elaborated on.