Symbolic-Interpretive Perspective on Groups

The symbolic-interpretive (S-I) perspective on groups provides a coherent explanation of symbol use in groups. Although relatively new, this perspective emerges from a long line of interpretive scholarship on symbol usage and sense-making. This perspective, then, is grounded in and synthesizes and applies to groups scholarship based on ethnomethodology, hermeneutics, the naturalistic paradigm, phenomenology, social constructionism, symbolic interactionism, and related philosophies. This perspective also incorporates tenets of other group communication theories, such as the bona fide group perspective, dialectical perspective, rhetorical perspective, symbolic convergence theory, and structuration theory. As this entry shows, the S-I perspective explicates how group members use symbols (words, objects, or actions that stand for or represent something else) and the effects of symbol usage on group processes and outcomes, including how groups themselves are products of members' symbolic activities.

The S-I perspective starts with the premise that symbolic activity is the primary social process that creates a group. This symbolic-constitutive focus means that a group is a significant, socially constructed symbol emerging from interactants' communicative behavior rather than an objective entity existing prior to or apart from that interaction. This constitutive process involves interactants symbolically constructing boundaries that create a meaningful relationship among what are now perceived to be fellow group members and that separate the group from other groups.

Expanding on this constitutive view of communication in creating groupness, the S-I perspective explicates the nature, practices, and consequences of using symbols in groups. Specifically, the symbolic-management focus explores three symbolic activities in groups: symbolic predispositions, practices, and processes and products.

Symbolic predispositions are people's tendencies toward symbolic behavior in groups, including symbolic behavior to which they are predisposed (e.g., members' communication traits, such as argumentativeness, and their beliefs about group communicative practices, such as taking turns speaking) and ways they interpret themselves and others based on symbols they believe are meaningful (e.g., dress, ethnicity, gender, and race). For instance, research shows that people predisposed to high communication apprehension talk less in groups and are perceived as less credible compared to those with lower levels. Symbolic predispositions, [Page 949]thus, are symbolic resources that people bring to groups and draw on in their interactions with other members.

Symbolic practices are the specific forms of verbal and nonverbal communication that group members use to interact. For instance, members often create a significant symbol for their group (e.g., Boston Celtics); employ metaphors to describe (conceptually and emotionally) it (e.g., family, even though members are not related by birth, marriage, or adoption, and do not live together and function as a single household); tell stories about the group that, among other things, socialize new members; and employ rituals (e.g., roll call) that become standard ways the group operates. As an example, research shows that group members often tell stories (“Remember when our group…”) and employ rituals (hold a wake) after the loss of a member, symbolic practices that not only help group members to remember that member but also to remember as a group.

As members engage in symbolic practices, they create symbolic processes and products—both macrolevel group dynamics (e.g., establishing boundaries and developing a culture) and microlevel group outcomes (e.g., creating mission statements and making decisions). In line with structuration theory, which views group structures and practices as interdependent, and in contrast to system theory, where group processes (throughputs) are a distinct set of variables that lead to group products (outputs), symbolic processes and products are explicitly linked together in the S-I perspective to emphasize their recursive and reflexive relationship. For instance, research shows that group development is both a process and a product that results from and influences group symbolic activity (e.g., using we rather than I statements both creates a new development stage and leads to increased use of such statements).

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