CC BY
13Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences 11 (2011 4) 1543-1552
УДК 316.622
The Phenomenon of "the Other" as a Socioforming Factor of Krasnoyarsk Region (Based on the Association Experiment Method by A.I. Nazarov)
Ekaterina V. Fedina*
Siberian Federal University 79 Svobodny, Krasnoyarsk, 660041 Russia 1
Received 12.03.2011, received in revised form 18.06.2011, accepted 9.10.2011
The fact that Krasnoyarsk region is not only an interethnic entity, but also a territory advantegous for international economic relations, motivates active migration of the representatives of other ethnic communities and nations to the region. So, it is necessary to find out the conditions that form socially relevant stereotypes in the mind of the young generation as it is the base of the development of the region and the future modelling of its development scenario in the framework of polyethnic environment. The present research presents a thesis on the possible applicability of the phenomenon of "the other" as a universal identity factor. It analyses the process offorming a sustainable socially relevant stereotype apparatus that determines the whole group behaviour pattern that exists in the cultural space. The main method of the application culture studies research is the association experiment that is a means of identifying the peculiarities of the relationship between a person and the environment, and the peculiarities of communicative behaviour, mental characteristics of a social group, the universal characteristics of an ethnos' language worldview in particular. The objective of the associative experiment is to research the interaction of the social group with other subjects on the basis of a traditional model of environment perception.
Keywords: "the other", sociocultural phenomenon, association experiment, application cultural research, applied psychology methods.
The work is carried out with the financial support of the federal purpose oriented program «Scientific and scientific-pedagogic staff in innovative Russia for 2009-2013».
Introduction
The phenomenon of "the other" is one of the key terms of such liberal arts as philosophy, sociology, psycholinguistics, cultural anthropology, culture studies, when it comes to reconstruction of a subject's qualitative characteristics. This sociocultural
* Corresponding author E-mail address: [email protected]
1 © Siberian Federal University. All rights reserved
term has been actively researched by Russian and foreign scholars at the turn of XXI century. Theoretical studies have been presented in works by various philosophers of different trends of postmodernism, like E. Levinas and N. Taleb. Though, the vagueness of the scientific definition of the phenomenon, absence of appropriate
- 1543 -
theoretic approach to studying the issue on the territory of Krasnoyarsk region are the main problems of the research.
This study applies the method of chain association experiment that implies the respondent to submit a chain of reaction words for a stimulus words within some limited amount of time. The main peculiarity of this method is an ability of the respondent to come up with associations that are neither related to the stimulus word nor reaction words that have been already mentioned by him or her. It is possible when the associative flow gets into the affective zone of the respondent. Personally relevant terms possess great associative power, which means that they are represented in a peculiar way in the language worldview (Petrenko, 2007).
N.P. Koptseva in her article opens up the modern problems of the applied cultural research methodology and modelling the social reality (Koptzeva, 2010). In particular, A.I. Nazarov describes the opportunities of the association experiment within the context of so-called active and passive knowledge of an individual (by analogy with active and passive vocabulary). The association experiment enables the researcher to study not only the structure and volume of the active knowledge in some certain field, but also the dynamics of its interaction with the passive knowledge (Nazarov et al., 2007).
In the modern application researches of sociocultural phenomena carried out both in our country and abroad, the association experiment has gained the status of a universal method ofinterpreting the features of the social group's mentality, which is topical in the process of continuous migration (Historiografic Overview..., 2010). It can be applied, in particular, to gathering data in order to do the subsequent modelling of human resources management (Koptzeva et al., 2010).
Within the framework of the problem set, it was decided to use the stimulus word "the
other" for writing a series of free associations in 15 minutes. The method applied is universal as it can cover a considerable number of reactions demonstrated by the respondents due to the mobility of the research process.
In December 2010 the method described above was proved on the 1, 2, 3, and 4 year students of both full-time and part-time departments of Siberian Federal University. The number of participant students counts 300 people. The experiment was carried out in several stages among the students of natural science and humanitarian departments. Each stage involved from 40 to 70 respondents.
"The other" is a sociocultural phenomenon that determines the worldview of the individual
The first stage of the research is theoretical basis for choosing the word "the other" as a stimulus. It is a description of the phenomena in domestic and foreign researches carried out during the XX and XXI centuries.
The Western researches tend to interpret the term from the point of view of social and philosophical approach as the fundamental factor that determines the peculiarity of the individual's worldview on the following three levels: egocentrical, sociocentric and cosmocentric.
Russian scientists, having considered the foreign theories concerning the phenomenon, describe the peculiarities of "the other" phenomenon on the basis of some philological methods: the term possesses a spectrum of some general properties and qualities for the subject that is actually interacting with the given phenomenon.
To sum up, the following definition can be formulated:
The other is a sociocultural phenomenon that sets the individual's worldview that determines the peculiarities of his values system.
The second stage of the research is the application research itself, which, in its turn, consists of some substages.
At first, familiarizing of the respondents with the poll system. After a brief greeting and introduction into the main objective of the research, the respondents were suggested to take a plain sheet of paper and write their age, sex and nationality. These data is necessary for pointing out the dominating age and sex groups, which, in the subsequent interpretation of the answer sheet, can clarify the hypothetic model of worldview of a person and the sociocultural space of Krasnoyarsk region. On the other hand, the replies submitted by the representatives of different nationalities widen the model of the modern communication in the context of the global transformation of the society.
After that, the respondents were asked to write the stimulus word "the other" on the sheet of paper and within 15 minutes write a series of free associations to it. The researcher checks the duration of the experiment. After that, the answer sheets were collected.
The results analysis is the second stage of the application research. The reaction words were classified according to the associative field to which they belong, which means according to the opportunity to find any links between the words in the largest scale. Due to the peculiarities of the research and the small number of respondents, all the words mentioned more than two times were considered. It enabled the researchers to study the quality of the individual's pattern of behaviour as a system and to trace the dynamics of its development from the periphery to the centre.
Due to the subjectiveness of the behaviour pattern it is relevant to take into account expressively positive and negative reaction words; the results will constitute the base for interpreting the social stereotypes formation.
A group of associations based on the features of a subject or an object is presented in Table 1.
The diagram presenting the associations dynamics is presented in Fig. 1.
This association group is an indicator the features of "the other" phenomenon for the
Table 1
Reaction words Number of associations given
strange 98
Alternative 80
Different (from others) 73
Different (from me) 29
Weird 28
Unusual 28
Belonging to me 22
Belonging to someone else 16
Special 16
Bad 12
Interesting 11
Dumb 11
Not mine 8
Good 7
Kindred 5
- 1545 -
100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0
Fig. 1
□ strange
■ alternative
■ different (from others)
□ different (from me)
■ weird
■ belonging to me
■ belonging to someone else, special
□ bad
■ interesting; dumb
□ not mine
□ good
□ kindred
subject contacting with it. We can not evaluate it from the point of view of positiveness or negativeness of each reaction word, but we can point out the evident positive and negative features for comparison: the negative feature "bad" dominates the negative "not belonging to me". Such results signify the ambiguousness, flexibility, changeability of the "other" in the sociocultural space.
It is worth noticing that the first three features dominate in their number, which means that such reactions as "strange", "alternative", "different (from others)" fix the opposition of "the other" to the subject.
The group of associations connected with the definition of sociocultural phenomena that have both direct and indirect bound with the subject, is shown in the table below.
The diagram presenting the associations dynamics is presented in Fig. 2.
This group covers the possible contact objects, it has no reaction words that would have any negative connotation. That is why it is possible to speak about positive, unbiased (or, vice versa, stereotypical) attitude of a personality during its communication with "the other".
The group of associations connected with the personal identity is shown in Table 3.
The diagram presenting the associations dynamics is presented in Fig. 3.
The present group suggests a series of possible social roles which the subject would associate "the other" with. Unlike the group of possible dialogue objects, the group of social roles suggests two conspicuous negative reaction words. This fact can be understood as stereotypical idea of the likeliness to face the negative features of the interlocutor that have been ascribed to them by social norms, in the space of social relations.
Data interpretation is the third stage of the application research. The selected data interpretation method is psycholinguistic method.
It enables the researcher to point out the possible predicative constructions that mark the fact of imaginary communicative situation into which the respondent is included in the process of the experiment. In this case the respondent's behaviour is more likely to be close to natural. On the other hand, this method combines psychological and linguistic points of view, taking
- 1546 -
Table 2
Reaction words Number of associations given
world 44
life 37
Gender 35
Colour (of hair, clothes) 29
World outlook (point of view) 23
Belief 23
City 21
Language 19
Smell (negative) 18
University 11
Day 10
Age 10
Way 9
Character 8
Time 8
Home 7
Country 6
Culture 5
Film 5
Family 3
Car 3
Dream 3
Style 3
Food 2
Rules 2
Betrayal 2
Behaviour 2
the specificity of both methods into account (Libakova, 2010).
In the consequent process of interpretation, the reaction words submitted by the respondents were systematized, the data was put into certain order. The dominating age group was the respondents aged 17 years old (99 people), Russian (252 people), females (189 people).
Data on the respondents is listed below.
111 males, 189 females; 12 sixteen year olds, 99 seventeen year olds, 50 eighteen year
olds, 48 nineteen year olds, 25 twenty year olds, 55 twenty one year olds, 14 twenty two year olds; among the respondents, there are 252 Russians, one American, eight Azerbaijanis, seven Tatars, one Czech, six Germans, one Portuguese, one Udmurt, one Estonian, three Jews, one Lezgin, two Tuvinians, four Yakuts, two Gypsies, four Evenkis, one Polish, two Chinese.
The percentage ratio of the age groups is shown in Fig. 4.
Fig. 2
Table 3
□ world
■ life
■ gender
□ colour (of hair, clothes)
■ world outlook (point of view); belief
■ city ■language
□ smell (negative)
■ university
□ day; age
□ way
□ character; time
■ home
■ country
■ culture; film
■ family; car; dream; style
□ food; rules; betrayal; behaviour
Reaction words Number of associations given
Human 74
Foreigner 57
Alien 53
Enemy 30
Outcast 11
Kadyrov 8
Zhirinovskiy 5
Moiseev 5
Me 4
Personality 4
Individuality 4
Elf 2
This data, according to the psycholinguistic method of interpretation, can be systematized type-wise: direct, indirect, syncretical, indefinite (Martinovich, 1993). In the context of the present research all the calculations were conducted taking the number of reactions into consideration.
Indirect reactions include the association pairs in which the relation word is not directly
connected to the stimulus word and is connected to it by means of a third (implicit) member. It can be schematically presented as follows: stimulus word - [X] - reaction reply.
In the present research the dominating example of indirect reaction is the connection pattern the other - [person] - popular personality in the Russian Federation fKadyrov, Zhirinovskiy.
Fig. 3
□ human
■ foreigner
■ alien
□ enemy
■ outcast
■ Kadyrov
■ Zhirinovskiy; Moiseev
□ me; personality; individuality
■ elf
□ 16 years old
■ 17 years old
□ 18 years old
□ 19 years old
■ 20 years old
□ 21 years old
■ 22 years old
Fig. 4
Moiseev) - 6 %. Other indirect reactions: the other - [characteristic] - individuality - 2 %; the other - [human] - betrayal - 1 %.
Direct reactions are, on one hand, the association pairs of words that don't have any explicit common features, and on the other hand, the association pairs of words that have such features (one member is one of the characteristics of another, relations with lexico-semantic, thematic fields and groups).
A dominating example of a direct reaction is the connection between the other - foreign -(33 %) that is an association based on contiguity that does not reflect any dominant features. Other
associations based on contiguity are: the other -weird/unusual - (9 %>); the other - special - (5 %>); the other - interesting / dumb / bad - (4 %); the other - outcast - (4 %); the other - good - (3 %); the other - kindred - (2 %).
Associations based on similarity connected to one dominant feature are listed below: the other - different - (27 %); the other - different from me - (10 %); the other - different from others - (8 %); the other - belonging to someone else - (5 %); the other - not mine - (3 %).
Syncretical type of reactions includes such pairs where different relations between the reaction word and the stimulus word (contiguity-
- 1549 -
□ syncretical associations (54%)
□ direct associations (42%)
□ indefinite associations
)
□ indirect associations
>0/
Fig. 5
similarity, determination-classification, directness-indirectness) can not be easily drawn.
A dominating example of this type of relations can be the connection between the other - human - (25 %). Other examples of syncretical association pairs are: the other -foreigner - (19 %); the other - an alien - (18 %); the other - world - (15 %); the other - life -(12 %); the other - gender - (12 %): the other -colour / enemy (10 %); the other - belief/ point of view - (8 %); the other - city - (7 %); the other - bad smell / language - (6 %); the other -university / day / way / age - (4 %); the other -time / character / country / home - (3 %); the other - film / culture / me / personality (2 %); the other - style / elf/ dream / car/family/food / behaviour - (1 %).
Indefinite reactions include, on one hand, association pairs, the specific meaning of which can not be revealed outside the context, and, on the other hand, association pairs that include indefinite parts of speech.
In the present research the only example of such reaction type is the connection between the other and belonging to me (11 %).
So, the most frequent reactions for stimulus word "the other" are syncretical associations (54 %).
The percentage ratio of associations is shown in Fig. 5.
In particular, it is possible to point out direct associations, contiguity based associations -22 %, similarity based associations - 20 %.
Summarized statistics can be understood, on one hand, as an index of contiguity (without universal feature) and similarity relations (that imply the presence of a universal feature) that in their turn reflect the main types of relations between the phenomena of objective reality that underlie the occurrence and existence of the majority of word associations in the language consciousness of the people. On the other hand, this data demonstrate a high rate of association pairs the members of which are predicatively connected and this connection fixes these reactions as utterance-texts created for real communication purposes and possess all its constituent features.
Conclusion
In the end it is possible to make some conclusions. First, the method of association experiment is determined by the universal methodology of specific culture researches in the field of social behaviour of a personality; some primary material for consequent work on the universal theoretical approach to studying social phenomena has been gathered.
Secondly, the features of "the other" in its movement from the positive to the negative are the fundamental; "the other" is a sociocultural
phenomenon, primarily positive in its attitude to the subject but consequently acquiring negative features in accordance with the social reality.
Thirdly, the peculiarity of the functioning of the phenomenon on the territory of Krasnoyarsk region has been pointed out. This peculiarity is
expressed in the features of the life-asserting associations that form the tendency to create the relations of the subject with a certain object or a subject. In this case the behaviour pattern is formed as a positive communication pattern, the main task of which is cognitive activity.
References
«Historiografic Overview of Approaches and Concepts Regarding the Issue of the Migration in International and Russian Research of the 20th Century, Journal of Siberian Federal University», Humanities & Social Sciences, 3(2010), 436-443.
N. Koptzeva, «Cultural and Anthropological Problem of Social Engineering (Methodological Problem at Modern Applied Culture Studies)», Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences, Vol. 3, 1(2010), 22-34.
N. Koptzeva and N. Bachova, «System of Culture in Krasnoyarsk Region: Main Subjects and Cultural Values», Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences, Vol. 3, 3(2010), 344 -381.
N. Libakova, «Specifics of the Category of «Gender» in the Modern Krasnoyarsk Culture: Results of the Association Experiment According to the Methodology «Thematic Associations Series»», Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences. Vol. 3, 5(2010), 727-746.
G. Martinovich, «Experience of Complex Research of Association Experiment Data», Psychology Issues, 4(1993), 93-99.
A. Nazarov and R. Sokolov, «Association and Association Experiment: Different Fates», Psychology Issues, 4(2007), 125-138.
V. Petrenko, Basics of Psychosemantics (Smolensk, 1997), 181-182, in Russian.
Феномен «другой» в качестве социообразующего фактора Красноярского края (На материале ассоциативного эксперимента по методике А. И. Назарова)
Е.В. Федина
Сибирский федеральный университет Россия 660041, г. Красноярск, пр. Свободный, 79
Красноярский край является не только межэтническим конгломератом, но и территорией благоприятной, для международных экономических отношений, что обуславливает активный процесс миграции на данную территорию представителей иных этнических общностей и наций. Необходимо выявить качественные условия формирования социально значимых стереотипов у представителей молодого поколения как основы развития края в будущем с последующим моделированием сценария в полиэтническом пространстве. Отражен тезис о
- 1551 -
возможной специфике феномена «другой» в качестве универсального фактора идентичности. Анализируется процесс формирования устойчивого социально значимого стереотипного аппарата мнений, которые определяют целостную модель поведения группы в культурном пространстве. Основным методом прикладного культурологического исследования выбран ассоциативный эксперимент, позволяющий выделить специфику отношений человека с окружающим миром, в частности, особенности коммуникативного поведения, ментальных характеристик социальной группы, ряд универсальных признаков языковой картины мира этноса. Ассоциативный эксперимент направлен на исследование взаимодействия социальной группы с иными субъектами на основе принятой модели восприятия социокультурной среды.
Ключевые слова: «другой», социокультурный феномен, ассоциативный эксперимент, прикладное культурное исследование, прикладные методы психологии.
Работа выполнена при финансовой поддержке федеральной целевой программы "Научные и научно-педагогические кадры инновационной России на 2009-2013 гг."
