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Social Constructionism

in Psychology

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All knowledge, includingpsychological

knowledge, ishistorically andculturally specific.

Common feature constant change

Social processes thefoundation of reality

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Implications for Psychology

Mental Illness

Social psychology

Cultural psychology

The Social Construction of Sex andGender

Language and culture

Deafhood

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Kenneth Gergen

the social process is the foundation ofreality (1985)

Feral humans

Language Knowledge transferred from one person to

another

Effective communication of knowledge: bothparties have a social agreement on theprinciples of the language as well as thecontext in which it is used

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Historicalbias

Cultural bias

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People attach meaning towords and situations and

these are exhibited throughlanguage

Is mental illness a modernphenomena?

Cultural understanding Impossible to have a

completely objectiveconversation of mental

illness because the wordssurrounding mental illnessare often negative (e.g.Mad, crazy etc)

Gadamer: understandingmeanin

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Mental Illness:recognised asreal only when

rooted in bio-physiology orindividual factors(NAMI)

Socially derived

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Social construction of self

Gergen (1996): our moment-to-moment decisions may depend onwhat we think of ourselves

Individuals shaped by othersexpressive behaviour towards self

Positive feedback effect

Unstable social patterns

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Socially Constructed Gender

Why do gender differences andinequalities exist?

Sociobiology: different reproductive

strategies Natural behaviours? marriage, abuse

of step-children, rape, adultery?

Sex/Gender if gendered traits dictatedby sex

We wouldnt need to learn them

We wouldnt need to punish those whodeviated from them

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Social interaction

Fausto-Sterling (2000)

There exists more than two sexes

We fix those who have ambiguous

genitals

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Why follow the rules?

Social control?

Cultural embeddedness?

We decide how to look and act? Subcultures?

Rewards/punishments?

Gender Identity Disorder

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Discourse

Comparing of individualsrealities

Reality is internal (External

behaviourism and person asmachine) Reality created by the mind Mind interacts with reality

through language

Opponents: subjective truthdestroys anything that

resembles tautological fact, oruniversal fact.

Chairhair

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Those who do not accept generallyaccepted norms and realities areoft labelled with psychopathological

diseases such as schizophrenia anddementia

Reality created by mind

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Additional alterations to ourconstructed reality in psychology

Deafhood

Deaf people use a different languageand have different culture than themajority of hearing people (2006)

Parietal and temporal lobe utilised

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Summary

Are you convinced that you aresocially constructed?

Social construction theory hasinteresting approaches and relevantinsights in psychology, that could

benefit from further investigation

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Further information

http://jhenner.wordpress.com/2006/09/29/115957439647402397/