Socio-psychological mechanisms of information influence in a post-industrial society

- Плющ, А.Н. (orcid.org/0000-0001-8398-5148) (2018) Socio-psychological mechanisms of information influence in a post-industrial society Masters thesis, Інститут соціальної та політичної психології.

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Abstract

In the dissertation, the synergetic conception of informational influence in post-industrial society is worked out. At the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries humanity proceeded to the new stage of its development, in which cardinal social changes are connected with informational and communicational technologies. A wide range of terms is used for its denotation, for example “post-industrial society”, “informational society”, “society of knowledge”, “communicational society”, “programmed society”. Post-industrial society provides new forms of socialization, based on free access to information and unregulated forms of its processing and social usage. Production of signs and sign systems, expressing meanings and creating goals of livelihood, is now the main sector of innovational economy and policy. It helps to manage over the mass behavior of individual subjects. Due to the fact that society moves to the permanent consumption, there is a temptation of superintendence over the processes of creating of virtual reality by setting control over informational flows. After having considered into account the variety of modern theoretical and practical methods of informational influence process` learning, the author argues the usage of synergetic approach that allows analyzing social phenomena and processes basing on multiparadigmality. While using this approach in order to learn the integrity, the researcher has to analyze the coordinated interaction between its parts, which form complex self-organized integrity. Using the synergetic methodology helps to broaden the scopes of analysis in comparison to the systematical approach. Cumulative analysis of complex sphere of the system`s functioning and its structural organization is supplemented by taking into account its difficult self-organization. In changing surroundings, each system, besides remaining the same, determines its own function in the meta-system. The example of such way of theoretical modeling is the creation of the text, when the author designs complex structure according to his own plan, which can be changed during writing the text. The understanding of main terms (society, discourse, information, communications, and informational influence) has been given. Society has been regarded as the collective text of generations, which is (re)constructed by the subjects of society during their livelihood. This text is reproduced according to the intention, e.g. societal discourse. This discourse is a permanently updated text, generated by society subjects in their communication. In the complex-organized society, the subject can create his inner world in the same way as the social world he is included in is organized. To name the process of the inner world designing different terms are used (implicit theory, intentional world image, cognitive map, social arrangements, schemes, scripts, frames etc.). In order to name it the author uses the term “discourse”, which is defined as the textual intention of the text of subject`s livelihood. During his socialization individual subject learns the social discourse version, basing on which he creates his own livelihood. The sequential causality can be seen, because the designing of the discourse of individual subject depends on the societal discourse in accordance with social livelihood. At the same time, the subject refreshes (reconstructs) the content of the societal discourse based on his individual discourse. Information is regarded as the text, which is an articulated fragment of the discourse of the subject of influence. Information is a certainly arranged range of signs, whom the author (within the confines of influential subject`s purposes) gives meaning to. At the same time, communication appears to be the sign exchange, an interaction between the subjects, constructing of common discourse. The members of communication can remain in three different role positions, such as the author of information, the member of communication and the co-author of mutual discourse. As a result, there arises an expanded understanding of the situation of informational influence. Informational consuming by individual subjects is replaced by the analysis of subject-subject communication, even to the point of understanding of social communications as the process of correction of societal discourse, which leads to creating of viable society. Analysis of discursive interaction between social subjects means that while achieving private goals in communication, they are constructing the mutual discourse, a part of the societal discourse. A “communication in communication” is the situation when the communication between the subjects is the part of societal discourse`s reproduction. By influencing on individual subjects, one can affect over societal discourse and transform the livelihood program of the whole society. There has been proposed the meaning of “informational influence” as discourse-striding activity, held in order for consumer to adopt the fragments of influential subject`s discourse, which is transmitted by information. This influence is meanwhile analyzed as an intention of the subjects, an expected result of their interaction, one of the processes of society`s self-organization. The model of psychological mechanisms of perception of information has been created. It possesses a great invariance (self-similarity). These mechanisms allow the consumer to reconstruct the fragments of discourse, underlying in information. There have also been given basic principles, such as recognition, understanding, and anticipation. They can be used as applied to the different structural parts of the text (signs, meanings, purposes), excreted by information`s user. According to the synergetic approach, three socio-psychological mechanisms of informational influence have been described. They are the designing of sign-made text of information, the creating of communicational social context, and the programming of informational consumer`s discourse. The activity, directed to create the social context of communication, unfolds in two dimensions, including meta-textual organization (informational flow) of influencing subject and organizing of social area, where the interaction between the subjects takes place. The activity of programming the discourse occurs in three dimensions, such as organizing of informational consumer`s livelihood, designing of his social communication area, and organizing of his self-communication. Proposed synergetic model of socio-psychological arrangements of informational influence has a great invariance. Three socio-psychological mechanisms interflow into one integrity and affect the consumer simultaneously, but each of them is organized like the text, consisting of discrete elements. These mechanisms constitute complex and sophisticated influential subject`s activity, which is unrolled depending on the level of planning and the difficulty of how this activity is organized. At the same time, informational influence is mediated by social impact of the author of information and inducted effect of influential subject. They start the self-organizing of the consumer of information. Complementarity between the organizing socio-psychological mechanisms of informational influence and psychological mechanisms of informational perception is emphasized. If the subject of informational influence composes the text, consumer begins the perception from the deconstruction of the text (-s). Such oppositions are selection of elements and recognition of elements, linking the elements and dismantling the integrity into pieces (which helps to understand the connection between the elements in allotted contexts), determination of logical designing of the integrity according to the purposes and anticipation of purposes of organized integrity. Complementarity between these processes enables to implement informational influence by “digestion“ of transmitted discourse`s fragments. It has been detected, that to examine the effectivity of informational influence (to evaluate the influential subject`s activity in order to promote his own discourse) one needs to analyze the efforts used by the subject of influence, the results obtained (changes made in the audience), and the goals achieved. A range of factors that can destroy the effectivity of promotion of the subject of influence is given (problems in setting on the information campaign, successful counterwork provided by the opponents, changes in the importance of the discourse offered). Technologies of informational influence have been described as activity committed in order to design the mechanisms of informayional influence, as „activity over activities“, which provides the promotion of discourse of the subject of influence. Modern informational technologies turn out to be not only the technical means of carriage of information, but also the instrument of influence, that helps to reconstruct the societal discourse. There have been several types of technologies of informational influence identified. Those can be - informational (designing of informational texts); - social (designing of social structures, which create and spread information, and the group subject of communicational situation); - mental (activity held in order to program the societal discourse in different srheres of its functioning, such as the livelihoood of society, the space of socail communication, and self-organizing of societal discourse). It has been discovered, that the strategies of informational security of the society provide for existence of high-guality societal discourse. The conditions, criteria and results of qualitative discourse are effectively-functioning („healthy“) society, management over the space of social communications, management over the process of (re-)constructioning of societal discourse. Under the sircumstances of globalization, the foundations of informational security of the society in the international arena are its technological competitive abilities, its capacity to take part in the creation of international unions producing the systems of collective security, its participation in the process of designing the globalization discourse being one of its author.

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