Drawing as a method of researching social representations

This paper explores the possibilities of drawing as a method of researching social representations. The theory of social representations focuses on studying the forms, contents, and functions of socially shared common knowledge. In this paper, we (1) present the central premises of social representations theory, (2) elaborate drawing as a visual research method, and (3) synthesize how the drawing method may promote and diversify our understanding of social representations. We suggest that the drawing method is especially fruitful in the analysis of objectification process (how something abstract is made tangible); cognitive polyphasia (the idea of the simultaneous existence of diverse and contradicting social representations); and the different levels of analysis in which social representations become observable: ontogenesis (individual level), microgenesis (social interaction level), and sociogenesis (societal level). Through these insights, this paper advances the current understanding of the drawing method in qualitative social representations research.

The Phenomenon of Cognitive Polyphasia in Social Representations on the Mentally

The present study is focused on the phenomenon of cognitive polyphasia in the context of representations of mentally ill people by different groups of society. The authors put at the forefront the problem of finding the conditions for the actualization of cognitive polyphasia. The study was aimed at identifying manifestations of cognitive polyphasia in the structure of social representations (SRs) of the mentally ill in the groups of Orthodox respondents and non-believers. The sample consisted of Orthodox Christians: N = 114 (49 males and 65 females) and non-believers: N = 113 (76 males and 37 females) in the age ranges 18-23, 40-45 and 60-65 years, permanently residing in Moscow. The survey of the respondents at the main stage of the research was carried out using: (1) the authors questionnaire developed on the basis of the results of the search stage and including 29 statements; (2) a scale of self-assessed degree of religiosity; (3) a modified D. Feldes Psychological Distance Scale; (4) a modified sentence completion method; (5) the Bubbles technique and (6) a question pool for obtaining socio-demographic information. The results showed that the emotional component of SRs of the mentally ill changed their modality depending on the survey methods used. When the respondents evaluated the statements of the questionnaire, the core of SRs in both groups contained elements that were extremely sympathetic towards the mentally ill, and the statements revealing negative emotions (the possibility of contracting a mental illness or the need to isolate these people from society) were on the periphery of their representations. At the same time, the data of the projective methods showed that the negative representation background (as compared to the positive one) in relation to mentally ill people significantly predominated among both believers and non-believers. The negative representation of the mentally ill is most pronounced in the group of non-believers and reaches the highest rates in the group of 60-65-year-old respondents. We regard such ambivalence as a manifestation of cognitive polyphasia and, in particular, its variety, i.e., selective prevalence.

Vaccination and the Prevention of Communicable Diseases in Healthcare Settings: Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic

With the number of Covid cases and Covid-related deaths continuing unabated, achieving a high vaccination coverage is essential to ensure the safety of staff and patients and resume normal hospital care admissions and operations. This article questions current strategies around vaccination in healthcare settings and proposes ways to understand and address vaccination hesitancy among staff. It offers insights on how to develop a multifaceted vaccination strategy, which takes into consideration vaccination hesitancy among healthcare professionals and community-specific factors. Drawing from social psychological theories, we suggest that the root of vaccination hesitancy lies in conflicting representations or cognitive polyphasia. In addition, we argue that current communication strategies mostly rely on rational arguments and ignores the importance of a more emotion-based approach.

Perspectival Worlds

This chapter argues that worlds of difference and culture are, by necessity, perspectival. This defining feature is supported by the polysemic uses of language and the open-ended nature of narratives. It is enhanced by the existence of various groups, communities, and relations between them, leading to a plurality of social representations. It is reflected in the state of cognitive polyphasia and the reflective dialogues we establish between different, sometimes even opposing, perspectives. Finally, it is supported by forms of engagement with our material environment that alternate between the use of things, objects, and artifacts. In all these instances, the world is discovered as perspectival and experienced as such. At the same time, perspectival worlds should not be taken for granted. There are active forces within them, fueled by power and inequalities within society, that make certain perspectives disappear and others gain a hegemonic position as a “view from nowhere.”

Social Representations of Insects as Food: An Explorative-Comparative Study among Millennials and X-Generation Consumers

The aim of the research here presented is to describe and compare the social representations of entomophagy co-constructed and circulating among different groups of consumers. Social representations theory (SRT) allows us to understand a social reality that the individual builds based on his own experience in everyday life symbolic exchanges, whose primary function is to adapt concepts and abstract ideas using objectification and anchoring processes. We carried out this research within the structural approach methodological framework. We explored the structure (central core and peripheral schemes) and the content (information, opinions, attitudes, and beliefs) of the social representations of entomophagy by using mixed methodological strategies (hierarchized evocations, validated scales, check-list, projective tool, open-ended questions). Data were processed employing different R packages. The main results show an essential role played by generative processes (objectification and anchoring) as well as cognitive polyphasia and thémata in the co-construction of the social representations of entomophagy. Data could help in understanding the sensory characteristics of “insects as food” that should be used or avoided, for example, in communication aimed to promote entomophagy.

Social Representation Theory: An Historical Outline

The concept of social representation (SR) was developed by Serge Moscovici in 1961 as a social psychological approach articulating individual thinking and feeling with collective interaction and communication. SRs are conceived as symbolic forms that come about through interpersonal and media communication. They are the ways individuals think, interact with others, and shape social objects in their interaction with the local world. This text presents an outline of the history of social representation theory (SRT), using a four-period model: first, creation and incubation in France starting with Moscovici’s first book; second, the opening to the English-speaking academe around 1980; third, institutionalization and proliferation with the start of the journal papers on SRs and regular conferences in 1992; and, fourth, normalization, approximately from 2000 onwards. The first period (1961–1984) started with Serge Moscovici’s first presentation of his ideas in a French-language volume on “La psychanalyse son image et son public.” This was republished in an updated version in 1976 and translated into English in 2008. The theory postulates cognitive and social factors in the genesis and structure of SRs. These are accompanied by specific styles of communication that reflect the communicators’ identity and ideology. Together these aspects constitute common sense. The first period was a time of incubation because Moscovici and his first PhD students, Claudine Herzlich, Denise Jodelet, and Jean-Claude Abric, tried the concept in different domains. The second half of this period saw Moscovici and collaborators extend SRT’s theoretical frame to include the idea of consensual vs. reified domains. A consensual domain of communication is characterized by the free interchange of attitudes and opinions, while a reified domain is determined by institutionalized rules. Moscovici also postulated a process of cognitive polyphasia. By cognitive polyphasia he described a phenomenon where individuals use different and even contradictory thoughts about the same issue depending on the social setting they are in. The year 1984 marked the publication of a book for English-speaking scholars edited by Robert Farr and Moscovici that collected papers from an international conference in 1979. It was the first book-length collection of works on SRT and highlighted empirical research by a variety of international scholars. The period following 1979 through to 1992 saw a broadening of the base of scholars becoming interested in SRT. The 1980s brought Willem Doise’s conceptualizing of anchoring as a process of social marking, Abric’s theory of core and peripheral elements of a representation, and Hilde Himmelweit’s founding of a societal psychology. Proliferation was boosted 1992 by the founding of the journal Papers on Social Representations and the beginning of a biannual series of International Conferences on Social Representations, starting in 1992. This increased the international visibility of SRT and helped scholars to organize themselves around topics and form cross-national research groups. The period from 1992 to the first decade of the new century was characterized by an increasing number of empirical and theoretical studies. A series of theoretical branches emerged: there was research on the micro-genesis of SRs on the individual level, an extension of the structural theory of SRs, the discussion of the socially constructive aspects and sociopolitical uses of SRT, the design of a dialogical approach to the mind and social life, and Moscovici’s suggestion to consider large-scale themata as a factor in social thinking. If the period after 1992 was a time of institutionalization, the time after the turn of the century can be called a period of normalization. That is, a period when SRT was presented in chapters for handbooks of social psychology and when dedicated handbooks and monographs were published. From this period onward it becomes virtually impossible to give even a superficial account of the most important contributions to SRT’s burgeoning field of research and theory development.

Cognitive polyphasia in a global south populist democracy: Mapping social representations of Duterte’s regime in the Philippines

Prevailing scholarship on populism focuses on explaining polarized patterns of support and opposition for populist regimes. This paper extends this conceptualization to account for the fragmented politics of Global South democracies. Invoking the concept of cognitive polyphasia, we map the Filipino public’s social representations of Duterte’s populist regime in the Philippines. Utilizing a mixed methods approach, we uncover a representational field organized by the two dimensions of political alignment (support vs. opposition) and political frame (individual vs. system). Diversely embedded in this polyphasic field, supporters of the regime may construct Duterte’s individual leadership in terms of paternalistic patriotism, or the broader government as a morally-bankrupt yet progressive technocracy. Opposition to the regime may frame the president as an oppressive tyrant, or his administration as a historical continuation of entrenched state violence. Our findings contribute to extant populism debates by describing unique representational processes of differentiation and annexation in unequal populist publics. We reflect on implications for democratic engagement in the Philippines and the broader Global South.