Social-Cognitive Perspective Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Social-Cognitive Perspective - Essay Example It emphasizes the role of biology and gene transmission across generations to explain current behaviors. Social Learning Perspective: Stresses the importance of unique experiences in family, school, community, etc. According to this viewpoint, we learn behaviors through observing and mimicking the behavior of people around us. Social-Cognitive Perspective: demonstrates an information processing model of social behavior, where we notice, interpret, and judge the behavior of others. New experiences may either be assimilated (using already held beliefs to interpret the event), or accommodated (which involves changing existing beliefs in response to the event.) By understanding the processing of information, we can better understand how patterns of thoughts impact behavior. One of the most important features of the social constructionist perspective is that much attention is given to the influence of the specific dialogues on the possible meanings. For example, to do justice to the self-understanding of the believing community, we cannot avoid the language of revelation. For practical theological discourse about revelation, this means that we have to consider the various dialogues in which different sets of criteria function. We encounter other branches of theology and engage in conversations with the social science and also connect with the church and the society in the process. A second important aspect of a social constructionist perspective is the emphasis on the performative dimension of language. Instead of asking what revelation is, what content is revealed, and how we can evaluate competing claims to revelation, a social constructionist practical theology will delve into what it means when someone invokes the language of revelation. This is not to be confused with relativism. The psychodynamic perspective originated from Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis and lays emphasis on the unconscious components such as conflicts and instinctual energies. "psychodynamics" is a general term which incorporates all the components but keeps the unconscious as a primary element. The reason why scientifically oriented psychologists dismiss this perspective is its emphasis on the unconscious which can neither be observed nor measured. A language-centered perspective toward the social-rhetorical construction of knowledge can be constructed by juxtaposing Kenneth Burke's philosophy of language with Thomas S. Kuhn's philosophy of science. Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions has "had a wider academic influence than any other single book of the last twenty years" (Gutting v). In particular, Kuhn is honored as "father of current social constructionist thought" in a variety of disciplines (Bruffee 779). Therefore, a cross-fertilization of these two important thinkers' viewpoints should be a fruitful endeavor. Recently, J.E. McGuire and Trevor Melia have argued against opinions regarding "rampant rhetoricism" in rhetoric of science scholarship ("Rhetoric"). They argue that while the form and validation processes of science display rhetorical qualities, the "content" of scientific discourse ( which scientific language is about) is ontologically different from that of other forms of discourse, and, hence, in an important sense, science qua science is non-rhetorical ("Some" 97). Those who describe rhetoric as epistemic emphasize that language "embodies and generates knowledge" that is relative to specific