Social representation

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Social representations theory is a framework in social psychology that explains how individuals and groups collectively construct shared understandings of the social, cultural, and scientific world, particularly in relation to unfamiliar or novel phenomena. Developed by French psychologist Serge Moscovici in his 1961 doctoral thesis La psychanalyse, son image et son public, the theory posits that social representations function as systems of values, ideas, and practices that serve two primary purposes: to enable people to orient themselves within their material and social environment by establishing order and mastery over it, and to facilitate communication among community members by providing a common code for naming, classifying, and exchanging ideas about reality.^[1] The theory emerged from Moscovici's empirical study of how psychoanalytic concepts, originating from scientific discourse, were disseminated and reinterpreted by the French public through everyday conversations and media in the post-World War II era. Influenced by Émile Durkheim's concept of collective representations, Moscovici adapted it to address the dynamic, communicative nature of modern societies, where knowledge is not static but actively produced through social interactions. Unlike traditional psychological approaches focused on individual cognition, social representations emphasize the collective and contextual generation of meaning, bridging the gap between scientific expertise and common sense.^[2] At its core, the theory highlights two key processes: anchoring and objectification. Anchoring involves integrating unfamiliar ideas into existing schemas or categories, such as linking a new scientific discovery to familiar cultural narratives to make it comprehensible. Objectification transforms abstract concepts into concrete, imaginable forms, often through metaphors or images that embody the representation in everyday language and practices. Additionally, the concept of cognitive polyphasia underscores the coexistence of multiple, sometimes contradictory, modes of knowledge within the same individual or group—such as scientific and traditional understandings—allowing for flexible adaptation to social changes.^[3] Social representations are not uniform but vary in form, including hegemonic representations that achieve widespread consensus across a society (e.g., views on health risks like vaccination), emancipated representations specific to subgroups, and polemic representations arising from conflicts between groups. This variability reflects the theory's emphasis on power dynamics, identity, and social influence in shaping collective thought. The framework has proven influential in fields beyond psychology, including media studies, where it analyzes how public issues like climate change are constructed through communication, and in health sciences, for understanding attitudes toward topics such as HIV/AIDS or mental health.^[4]

Foundations

Definition

Social representations are systems of values, ideas, and practices that enable individuals to communicate with one another, orient themselves within their social and material environment, and master that environment.^[5] This concept, originally conceptualized by Serge Moscovici in his 1961 doctoral thesis La psychanalyse, son image et son public, frames social representations as a form of collectively elaborated knowledge that bridges the gap between scientific abstraction and everyday understanding.^[5] They function as cognitive and symbolic tools, transforming unfamiliar or novel elements into familiar, communicable entities within a group.^[6] Unlike attitudes, which are primarily individual evaluations shaped by personal experiences and cognitive processes, social representations are inherently collective and emergent from interpersonal interactions and communication.^[7] Similarly, they differ from ideologies, which tend to be more systematic, stable, and tied to political or institutional structures, by emphasizing dynamic, shared constructions of meaning in routine social life rather than prescriptive doctrines.^[5] This focus on everyday knowledge production positions social representations as a key mechanism for collective sense-making, allowing groups to negotiate and stabilize their perceptions of the world.^[6] At their core, social representations rely on common-sense knowledge as a foundational element, supplemented by building blocks such as naming—which assigns labels to phenomena—and classification—which organizes them into meaningful categories to facilitate social orientation.^[5] These components enable the integration of abstract ideas into practical, shared frameworks. Processes like anchoring and objectification further operationalize these representations by linking new information to existing knowledge structures and embodying abstract concepts in concrete forms.^[5] An illustrative example is the social representation of psychoanalysis in 1950s France, where this emerging scientific approach to mental processes—an initially unfamiliar and alien concept—was rendered familiar through collective discourse, metaphors, and everyday analogies, thereby allowing the public to engage with and domesticate it.^[5] This case highlights how social representations transform potentially disruptive novelties into stable elements of common understanding.^[6]

Historical Origins

The theory of social representations originated in the work of French psychologist Serge Moscovici, who first introduced the concept in his 1961 doctoral thesis, published as the book La Psychanalyse, son image et son public in 1961 (revised edition 1976; translated into English in 2008, based on the revised edition). This seminal work was based on an empirical investigation into the reception and transformation of psychoanalysis as a novel scientific idea within French society during the mid-20th century.^[5]^[2] Moscovici's formulation drew on several key intellectual influences from European social thought. Émile Durkheim's concept of collective representations provided a foundation for understanding shared systems of knowledge that sustain social cohesion, which Moscovici adapted to emphasize dynamic processes of communication and interaction.^[5] Structuralist ideas from Claude Lévi-Strauss informed the theory's attention to underlying structures in how societies process and organize unfamiliar concepts, while Sigmund Freud's theories on the unconscious shaped Moscovici's exploration of psychological dimensions in collective sense-making, particularly in the context of psychoanalysis itself.^[5]^[2] The theory emerged in the specific historical context of post-World War II France, a period marked by profound social upheavals including decolonization efforts, economic reconstruction, and increasing secularization, which challenged traditional beliefs and opened spaces for new scientific and psychological ideas.^[5] These changes acted as catalysts for Moscovici's interest in how innovative concepts like psychotherapy were integrated—or resisted—into everyday public discourse, reflecting broader tensions in a society grappling with modernity and minority influences.^[2] Early milestones in the theory's development included Moscovici's fieldwork conducted in the 1950s and 1960s, which involved analyzing representations of psychotherapy in French media, interviews, and casual conversations. This research revealed patterns of resistance, reification, and transformation, demonstrating how social groups collectively negotiate and reshape unfamiliar knowledge to fit existing cultural frameworks.^[5]^[2]

Core Mechanisms

Anchoring

Anchoring serves as a fundamental mechanism in social representations theory for incorporating novel or unfamiliar phenomena into pre-existing cognitive and cultural frameworks, primarily through the process of comparing them to familiar categories, stereotypes, or social norms to render them intelligible and less threatening. This assimilation draws on collective knowledge, allowing groups to classify and name the new element within established discourses, thereby facilitating shared understanding and social orientation.^[8] Originating from Serge Moscovici's foundational work, anchoring emphasizes how individuals and communities cope with uncertainty by linking the unknown to the known, often through linguistic labeling or metaphorical association. Key subprocesses include naming, which assigns familiar labels to the unfamiliar; emotional anchoring, linking it to affective responses like fear; and thematic anchoring, integrating it into cultural narratives.^[9] A prominent example of anchoring occurred in the 1980s with the emergence of HIV/AIDS, which was rapidly integrated into existing representations across cultures. In Western contexts, it was often compared to historical "plagues" like the Black Death, evoking notions of inevitable doom and quarantine, while in other settings, it was anchored to "moral deviance," associating the virus with stigmatized behaviors such as homosexuality or promiscuity, as seen in early labels like "gay plague."^[10] These anchorings, documented in studies of media and public discourse, highlighted cultural variations, such as links to voodoo in Haitian representations or foreign "otherness" in global narratives.^[11] Theoretically, anchoring plays a crucial role in stabilizing social representations by embedding innovations or threats within familiar structures, promoting consensus and continuity in group thought. However, this stabilization can engender distortions, as the new phenomenon is selectively interpreted through biased lenses, potentially perpetuating stereotypes or oversimplifications. Empirical evidence from studies on technological innovations illustrates this duality; for example, early encounters with computers were anchored to typewriters or televisions, stabilizing their perception as communication tools but distorting their programmable complexity by likening them to human brains.^[12] Similarly, among elderly non-users in Finland, the internet was anchored to "overgrown pathways," reinforcing stable but exaggerated views of danger and social isolation, which hindered adoption.^[12] Such findings underscore anchoring's dual function in both enabling comprehension and constraining innovative reinterpretations.^[13]

Objectification

Objectification refers to the process in social representation theory whereby abstract and complex ideas are transformed into concrete, tangible forms such as images, symbols, or metaphors, rendering them more accessible and "real" within everyday social discourse. This mechanism bridges the conceptual and perceptual realms by reifying intangible notions, allowing individuals to grasp and communicate them through sensory or figurative means. As described by Moscovici, objectification makes abstract concepts interchangeable with precepts, facilitating their integration into common sense knowledge.^[14]^[15] The primary mechanisms of objectification include personification, where abstract ideas are embodied in human figures; analogies, which draw parallels to familiar objects or processes; and visual tropes that evoke iconic representations. For instance, personification occurs when psychoanalysis is linked to Sigmund Freud himself, portraying the theory as an extension of his personal genius, or when political non-violence is embodied in Mahatma Gandhi's figure. Analogies further concretize ideas, such as depicting the economy as a "machine" that requires efficient maintenance or an "organism" that grows and adapts, thereby simplifying economic dynamics for public understanding. These techniques reduce cognitive complexity, enabling broader social circulation of representations.^[4] A notable example is the objectification of nuclear energy in 1970s public discourse, where it was metaphorically framed as a "double-edged sword," invoking mythological imagery akin to Prometheus' fire—a gift of progress that simultaneously harbors destructive potential. This figurative rendering drew on ancient myths to capture the ambivalence toward nuclear power, blending themes of innovation and peril in media and conversations. Such objectifications often build upon prior anchoring processes, where the unfamiliar is first categorized within existing schemas.^[16] Theoretically, objectification enhances emotional engagement by endowing abstract representations with vivid, sensory qualities that evoke feelings and facilitate interpersonal sharing. Qualitative analyses of media content and interview data reveal how these concretized forms amplify affective responses, making representations more memorable and propagable across social networks, thus reinforcing their role in collective sensemaking.^[8]

Theoretical Evolution

Early Interpretations

Following Serge Moscovici's foundational work on social representations in the 1960s, early interpretations in the 1970s and 1980s focused on refining the theory's structural dimensions and its application to everyday social contexts.^[5] A pivotal contribution came from Jean-Claude Abric, who in the late 1970s introduced the central nucleus theory, distinguishing between central elements—stable, normative components that define the representation's meaning—and peripheral elements, which are more flexible and context-dependent, allowing adaptation to specific situations.^[17] This structural approach emphasized how the central core anchors the representation's coherence while the periphery facilitates its evolution in response to social changes.^[18] Complementing this, Denise Jodelet explored social representations in everyday life, particularly through ethnographic studies in the 1980s, highlighting their role in organizing communal knowledge and practices, such as in her analysis of mental illness in a French village where representations structured daily interactions and social norms.^[19] Jodelet's work underscored the dynamic, lived aspects of representations, integrating structural elements with socio-cultural processes to show how they mediate between individual experiences and collective realities.^[5] Scholars in this period also debated the theory's scope, particularly how social representations operate in stable versus changing societies. In stable contexts, representations were seen as reinforcing established social orders, while in dynamic environments, they facilitated adaptation to novelty.^[3] Central to these discussions was Moscovici's distinction between consensual universes—characterized by fluid, communicative knowledge shared in communal settings—and reified universes, where knowledge is formalized and institutionalized, such as in scientific or legal domains, influencing how representations stabilize or transform across societal contexts.^[20] For instance, in consensual settings like community discussions, representations emerge through negotiation, whereas in reified ones, they draw on authoritative structures to legitimize practices, with examples including institutional knowledge in education versus everyday communal beliefs about health.^[5] Methodological advancements during the 1970s and 1980s included the adoption of qualitative techniques to map representations, such as thematic analysis of interviews and discourses, which allowed researchers to identify recurring themes and structural patterns without relying solely on experimental paradigms.^[21] These approaches, often applied in European studies, enabled the exploration of representations in natural settings, revealing how anchoring and objectification—processes linking unfamiliar ideas to familiar ones—manifest in verbal and behavioral data.^[22] The solidification of anchoring and objectification as core processes was further advanced through 1980s conferences in Europe, notably the 1979 meeting organized by Robert Farr and Moscovici at the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme in Paris, which brought together researchers to discuss these mechanisms in relation to social communication and knowledge transformation.^[19] Subsequent gatherings in the early 1980s, hosted by European social psychology laboratories, fostered conceptual clarifications and empirical refinements, establishing these processes as essential for understanding representation dynamics.^[5]

Modern Developments

In the post-1990s era, social representation theory has increasingly integrated with discourse analysis, particularly through Michael Billig's rhetorical psychology, which emphasizes how representations emerge from argumentative and dialogic processes in everyday communication. This integration highlights representations not as static cognitive structures but as dynamic outcomes of rhetorical contests, where competing voices shape collective understandings.^[23] Concurrently, connections to cognitive science have advanced, with efforts to merge social representations with schema theory, viewing them as culturally embedded cognitive frameworks that facilitate sense-making in social contexts.^[24] These advancements have introduced dynamic models of representation change, especially influenced by social media, where rapid dissemination and user interactions accelerate the evolution of shared meanings, as seen in real-time shifts during global events.^[25] Global expansions of the theory have emphasized adaptations in non-Western contexts, revealing cultural variability in how representations form and function. Post-2000 studies on climate change in Asia, for instance, demonstrate how representations in Taiwan integrate local environmental concerns with global scientific discourse, often prioritizing immediate societal impacts over abstract ecological threats.^[26] Such research underscores the theory's flexibility across cultures, with Asian applications highlighting collective orientations influenced by relational social structures, contrasting with more individualistic Western models.^[27] This cross-cultural lens has enriched the theory by illustrating how peripheral elements—flexible components surrounding a stable central core—allow representations to adapt to diverse socio-historical contexts without undermining core meanings.^[5] Recent conceptual developments include Willem Doise's sociogenetic approach, which posits that peripheral elements play a crucial role in representational flexibility by enabling socio-cognitive conflicts that drive transformation through group interactions.^[5] Complementing this, Ivana Marková's dialogical theory stresses intersubjectivity, framing representations as inherently relational products of dialogue between self and other, where meaning arises from tension and negotiation rather than isolated cognition.^[28] These ideas have gained traction in addressing contemporary phenomena, promoting a view of representations as fluid and co-constructed. In the 2020s, the influence of digital communication on rapid representation formation has become prominent, with social media platforms facilitating swift anchoring and objectification of new ideas. Studies on COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy, for example, reveal how online discourses generated polarized representations, associating vaccines with themes of government control or scientific salvation, which evolved quickly in response to misinformation and policy announcements.^[29] This digital acceleration challenges traditional models by demonstrating how peripheral elements can destabilize central cores under high-velocity information flows, informing updated empirical strategies for public health interventions.^[25]

Applications and Empirical Evidence

Social representations theory has been instrumental in social psychology for analyzing minority influence, particularly through Moscovici's conversion theory, which posits that consistent and flexible minority positions can transform majority views by generating new social representations that challenge existing norms.^[30] This framework highlights how minorities foster deeper cognitive change, or "conversion," rather than superficial compliance, by anchoring novel ideas within group dynamics.^[31] In intergroup contexts, the theory elucidates identity formation by showing how shared representations construct and maintain social identities, enabling groups to navigate conflicts and affirm distinctiveness through collective meanings.^[32] Empirical evidence in social psychology often employs quantitative methods, such as structural equation modeling, to delineate the latent structures and pathways within social representations, revealing how cognitive elements interrelate in group settings.^[33] For instance, studies on representations of unemployment in labor contexts have demonstrated how economic downturns anchor attributions of joblessness to individual failings or societal failures, influencing attitude formation and group cohesion among the unemployed. These investigations underscore variations in representational content based on socioeconomic positions, with unemployed individuals often objectifying unemployment as a stigmatized identity that disrupts social bonds.^[34] A seminal example is Doise's cross-national research on human rights representations in European countries, which utilized surveys across diverse social strata to show how representations vary by position—such as gender, education, and nationality—anchoring rights as universal ideals or context-specific obligations.^[35] This work revealed that lower-status groups emphasized economic rights more prominently, while higher-status groups prioritized civil liberties, illustrating the theory's role in unpacking intergroup attitude differences. Methodological tools central to these applications include facet analysis, which systematically maps the multidimensional facets of representations to identify core and peripheral elements, and questionnaire-based approaches that elicit free associations and rankings to chart representational structures across groups.^[33] These techniques facilitate the empirical dissection of how representations stabilize group dynamics while adapting to social change.^[36]

Interdisciplinary Uses

Social representation theory has found significant application in health sciences, particularly in understanding public perceptions of infectious diseases like Ebola. During the 2013–2016 West Africa outbreak, social representations framed Ebola as an inherently African issue intertwined with global fears, evoking emotions such as anger and helplessness that hindered effective response strategies.^[37] These representations influenced multidisciplinary knowledge production, including medical anthropology and public health communication, by revealing how cultural narratives shaped community compliance with interventions.^[38] In mental health, the theory elucidates stigma as rooted in shared representations of illness as dangerous or morally deficient, which perpetuate discrimination and barrier access to care.^[39] For instance, relatives of schizophrenia patients often associate the condition with social deviance, linking stigma directly to these representational structures.^[40] Such insights have informed public policy, with the World Health Organization (WHO) incorporating anti-stigma frameworks into mental health initiatives from 2014 to 2024, emphasizing social contact to reshape representations and promote equitable policies.^[41] In environmental studies, social representation theory examines how media portrayals of climate change construct collective understandings that drive or impede sustainability behaviors. Post-2015 Paris Agreement, analyses of social media discourses have identified growing ideological polarization, where representations oscillate between catastrophe and denial, affecting public engagement with emission reduction efforts.^[42] Research highlights divergences between mainstream and social media, with the latter amplifying activist narratives that foster pro-environmental actions in diverse global contexts.^[43] Local case studies, such as those in the French island of Mayotte, demonstrate how semantic variations in representing climate impacts—often reframed through cultural lenses like "seasonal changes"—influence community adaptation strategies.^[44] These applications underscore the theory's role in policy design, linking media-driven representations to behavioral shifts toward sustainability. Beyond health and environment, the theory informs education by exploring representations of intelligence, which shape teaching practices and equity in learning. Essentialist views, portraying intelligence as fixed and innate, prevail in some educational discourses, reinforcing social hierarchies and limiting inclusive pedagogies.^[45] In political science, social representations elucidate populism's appeal during 2020s elections, where qualitative methods like in-depth interviews reveal how voters construct the "people" versus "elites" dichotomy.^[46] Ethnographic approaches further unpack these dynamics in contexts like European far-right movements, blending discourse analysis with observational data to trace representational shifts in voter mobilization.^[47] A foundational interdisciplinary example is Denise Jodelet's 1991 ethnographic study of madness representations in the French community of Ainay-le-Château, where local families housed mentally ill individuals under a deinstitutionalization program. Through processes of anchoring in everyday norms and objectification via physical separation (e.g., distinct living quarters), residents maintained social distance while integrating the "mad" into community life, illustrating how representations sustain ambivalence toward otherness.^[48] This work, drawing on long-term fieldwork, has influenced applications in sociology and public health, providing a model for analyzing similar representational mechanisms in modern debates on asylum seeker integration and mental health deinstitutionalization.^[49]

Critical Perspectives

Status and Prevalence

Social representations theory maintains a prominent status within social psychology, particularly in Europe and Latin America, where it has inspired a strong tradition of empirical research and theoretical elaboration.^[50] Thousands of scientific articles have been published on the theory since its inception, reflecting its enduring influence and progressive development across diverse cultural contexts.^[51] Dedicated outlets, such as the international journal Papers on Social Representations, have played a key role in advancing its methodological and conceptual frameworks since its establishment.^[52] The theory's global spread encompasses numerous countries, with robust adoption in regions like Europe, Latin America, and Asia, where it aligns with local epistemological needs for understanding collective sense-making.^[53] Notable concentrations of research appear in Brazil, where studies apply the theory to topics like violence and health among vulnerable populations, and in Australia, contributing to analyses of multiculturalism and environmental issues.^[54] ^[55] However, its integration faces challenges in Anglo-American psychology, stemming from historical and paradigmatic differences that prioritize cognitive biases over socially constructed meanings.^[56] In practical applications, social representations theory informs public communication strategies, including European Union health campaigns in the 2020s aimed at boosting vaccine uptake during the COVID-19 pandemic. For instance, analyses of social representations of COVID-19 vaccines among vaccinated Italian adults highlighted barriers to acceptance, guiding targeted messaging to reshape collective understandings and enhance immunization rates.^[57] Key metrics underscore the theory's impact: Serge Moscovici's oeuvre, foundational to the field, achieves an h-index of 91 with over 103,000 citations as of November 2025, while interdisciplinary citations extend its reach into media studies, cultural psychology, and public health.^[58]

Key Criticisms

One major conceptual critique of social representation theory concerns its vagueness in delineating boundaries between social representations and related constructs such as cognitive schemas, attitudes, ideologies, or common sense knowledge. Critics argue that this overlap leads to conceptual ambiguity, making it difficult to distinguish social representations from broader cultural or ideological frameworks, as highlighted by Jahoda (1988) in his analysis of definitional issues in cross-cultural psychology.^[59] Additionally, the theory has been faulted for an overemphasis on the stability of representations, potentially underplaying their fluidity and contextual variability; Wagner (1998) counters this by emphasizing how representations emerge from symbolic coping with "brute facts," allowing for dynamic adaptation in social contexts rather than rigid structures.^[59] Methodological criticisms focus on the theory's heavy reliance on qualitative methods, such as interviews and content analysis, which can introduce subjectivity and interpretive bias without standardized quantification. Unlike attitude scales in traditional social psychology, social representation research often lacks comparable rigorous, replicable measures, complicating empirical validation and cross-study comparisons.^[59] Billig's discourse-based challenges further underscore this, arguing that the theory's focus on anchoring and objectification treats representations as static cognitive entities, neglecting the argumentative and rhetorical dynamics of everyday talk that shape social meaning in fluid, contested ways.^[59] Recent applications of the theory continue to evolve, including in digital media and global health contexts post-COVID-19, demonstrating its adaptability while prompting further methodological refinements.

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[PDF] Social representations : the versatility of a concept
Its major concern is to discuss the versatility of the concept considering the historical conditions of its entry into Anglo- saxon social psychology.
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The social representations of COVID-19 vaccines among not ...
Nov 3, 2025 · This study contributes to fill this research gap by examining the social representations of COVID-19 vaccines among vaccinated Italian adults.
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École Normale Supérieure - University Profile - Research.com
Nov 27, 2024 · H-Index H-index value (measuring the impact of scientific work of a scholar) ... Serge Moscovici. H-index 55 Citations ...
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A Review of Controversies about Social Representations Theory
This paper reviews four major controversies that lie in the areas of (a) theoretical ambiguities, (b) social determinism, (c) cognitive reductionism and (d) ...Missing: universes | Show results with:universes