Symbolic Interactionism is a sociological theory that has had a great impact on contemporary social psychology, as well as on other areas of study in the social sciences. This theory analyzes interactions, and their meanings, in order to understand the process through which individuals become competent members of a society.

Since the first half of the 20th century, Symbolic Interactionism has generated many different currents, as well as its own methodologies that have had great importance in the understanding of social activity and in the construction of the “I”.

What is Symbolic Interactionism?

Symbolic Interactionism is a theoretical current that emerged in sociology (but quickly moved towards anthropology and psychology), and which studies interaction and symbols as key elements for understanding both individual identity and social organization.

In very broad terms, what Symbolic Interactionism suggests is that we people define ourselves according to the meaning that ‘the individual’ acquires in a specific social context ; a question that depends to a great extent on the interactions that we establish.

Pragmatism, behaviorism and evolutionism are found in its origins, but far from being inscribed in any of them, Symbolic Interactionism moves between them.

Among its antecedents is also the defense of ‘situated truths’ and partial truths, as opposed to ‘absolute truths’, which have been criticized by a good part of contemporary philosophy for considering that the notion of ‘truth’ has been quite confused with the notion of ‘beliefs’ (because, from a pragmatic point of view on human activity, truths have the same function as beliefs).

Stages and main proposals

Symbolic Interactionism has gone through many different proposals. In general terms, we recognize two great generations whose proposals are connected to each other, sharing the bases and antecedents of the theory, but which are characterized by some different proposals.

1. Beginnings of Symbolic Interactionism: actions always have a meaning

One of the main proposals is that identity is built mainly through interaction , which is always symbolic, that is, it always means something. That is to say, the individual identity is always in connection with the meanings that circulate in a social group; it depends on the situation and the places that each individual occupies in that group.

Thus, interaction is an activity that always has a social sense, in other words, it depends on our ability to define and give meaning to individual and social phenomena: the ‘order of the symbolic’.

In this order, language is no longer the instrument that faithfully represents reality, but rather is a way of manifesting the attitudes, intentions, positions or objectives of the speaker, with which language is also a social act and a way of constructing that reality.

Thus, our actions are understood beyond a set of habits or automatic behaviors or expressive behaviors. Actions always have a meaning that can be interpreted.

From this it follows that the individual is not an expression; it is rather a representation , a version of oneself that is constructed and discovered through language (language that is not isolated or invented by the individual, but belongs to a logic and a specific social context).

In other words, the individual is constructed through the meanings that circulate while interacting with other individuals. Here arises one of the key concepts of Symbolic Interactionism: the “self”, which has served to try to understand how a subject constructs these versions of himself, that is, his identity.

In short, every person has a social character, so individual behaviors must be understood in relation to group behaviors. That is why several authors of this generation focus especially on understanding and analyzing socialization (the process by which we internalize society).

Methodology in the first generation and main authors

In the first generation of the Symbolic Interactionism arise qualitative and interpretative methodological proposals, for example the analysis of the speech or the analysis of the gestures and the image; that are understood as elements that not only represent but also construct a social reality.

The most representative author of the beginnings of Symbolic Interactionism is Mead, but Colley, Pierce, Thomas and Park, influenced by the German G. Simmel, have also been important. Likewise the Iowa school and the Chicago school are representative, and Call, Stryker, Strauss, Rosenberg and Turner, Blumer and Shibutani are recognised as authors of the first generation.

2. Second generation: social life is a theatre

In this second stage of Symbolic Interactionism, identity is also understood as the result of the roles that an individual adopts in a social group, with which, it is also a kind of scheme that can be organized in different ways depending on each situation.

Of special relevance is the contribution of Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical perspective , who suggests that individuals are basically a set of actors, because we literally constantly act out our social roles and are expected to do so according to those roles.

We act to leave a social image of ourselves, which not only happens during interaction with others (who are the ones who reflect the social demands that will make us act in a certain way), but it happens even in the spaces and moments when those other people are not seeing us.

Methodological proposals and main authors

The everyday dimension, the study of meanings and the things we appear to be during the interaction are objects of scientific study. On a practical level, the empirical methodology is very important . That is why Symbolic Interactionism is related in an important way with phenomenology and with ethnomethodology.

This second generation is also characterised by the development of etogeny (the study of human-social interaction, which analyses above all these four elements: human action, its moral dimension, the capacity of agency that we have as persons and the very concept of person in relation to his or her public action).

In addition to Erving Goffman, some authors who have influenced much of the Symbolic Interactionism of this time are Garfinkel, Cicourel and the most representative author of ethogeny, Rom Harré.

Relationship with social psychology and some criticism

Symbolic Interactionism had an important impact on the transformation from classical Social Psychology to Postmodern Social Psychology or New Social Psychology. More specifically, it has impacted on Discourse Social Psychology and Cultural Psychology, where, from the crisis of traditional psychology in the 1960s, concepts that had been previously dismissed, such as reflexivity, interaction, language, and meaning, took on special relevance.

In addition, Symbolic Interactionism has been useful in explaining the process of socialization, which was initially proposed as an object of study in sociology, but which quickly became connected with social psychology.

It has also been criticized as reducing everything to the order of interaction, that is, reducing the interpretation of the individual to social structures. Likewise has been criticized at a practical level for considering that its methodological proposals do not appeal to objectivity nor to quantitative methods.

Finally, there are those who consider that it raises a rather optimistic idea of interaction, since it does not necessarily take into consideration the normative dimension of the interaction and of the social organization.

Bibliographic references

  • Fernández, C. (2003). Psicologías sociales en el umbral del siglo XXI (Social psychologies on the threshold of the 21st century). Editorial Fundamentals: Madrid
  • Carabaña, J. and Lamo E. (1978). The social theory of symbolic interactionism. Reis: Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, 1: 159-204.