The concepts of society and system, social ties, social interaction, social relations. Social connections and interactions Social interactions of people in society

Sociologists have long searched for those simplest social elements with which they could describe and study social life as a set of infinitely diverse events, actions, facts, phenomena and relations. It was necessary to find the phenomena of social life in the simplest form, indicate an elementary case of their manifestation, construct and recreate their simplified model, studying which, the sociologist would be able to consider increasingly complex facts as a combination of these simplest cases or as an infinitely complicated example of this model. The sociologist must find, in the words of P.A. Sorokin, "social cell", studying which, he would receive knowledge of the basic properties of social phenomena. This simplest "social cell" is the concept of "interaction", or "interaction", which refers to the basic concepts of sociology as a science of the development of society. Interaction, which ultimately manifests itself as the social behavior of individuals in society, has become the subject of analysis in the works of such outstanding sociologists of the 20th century as P.A. Sorokin, G. Simmel, E. Durkheim, T. Parsons, R. Merton, D. Homans and others.

Social interactions of people in society

Social contacts

The problems of the formation of relationships in society from the simplest to the most complex, the mechanism of social action, the specificity of social interaction, the very concept of "social system" have been developed in detail and studied at two main levels of sociological research - micro and macro levels.

At the micro level, social interaction (interaction) is any behavior of an individual, group, society as a whole, both at the moment and in the future. Each action is caused by the previous action and at the same time acts as the cause of the subsequent action. It is a system of interdependent social actions linked by a cyclical causal dependence, in which the actions of one subject are both a cause and a consequence of the response actions of other subjects. Interpersonal interaction can be called interaction at the level of two or more units of interpersonal communication (for example, a father praising his son for a good study). On the basis of experiments and observations, sociologists analyze and try to explain some types of behavior that characterize the interaction between individuals.

At the macro level, the study of interaction is carried out on the example of such large structures as classes, strata, army, economy, etc. But the elements of both levels of interaction are intertwined. Thus, the daily communication of soldiers of one company is carried out at the micro level. But the army is a social institution that is studied at the macro level. For example, if a sociologist studies the reasons for the existence of hazing in a company, then he cannot adequately investigate the issue without referring to the state of affairs in the army, in the country as a whole.

The simple, rudimentary level of interaction is spatial contacts. We constantly encounter people and build our behavior in transport, shop, at work, taking into account their interests and behavior. So, when we see an elderly person, we usually give him the way at the entrance to the store, freeing him up a place in public transport. In sociology, this is called “ visual spatial contact»(The behavior of the individual changes under the influence of the passive presence of other people).

Concept "Putative spatial contact"is used to refer to a situation in which a person does not visually collide with other people, but assumes that they are present in some other place. So, if it gets cold in the apartment in winter, we call the housing office and ask them to check the hot water supply; entering the elevator, we know for sure that if the attendant's help is needed, we must press a button on the control panel and our voice will be heard, although we do not see the attendant.

As civilization develops, society shows more and more attention to a person so that in any situations he feels the presence of other people who are ready to help. Ambulance, fire brigade, police, traffic police, sanitary epidemiological stations, helplines, rescue services, mobile operator services, computer network technical support departments and other organizations are created in order to ensure and maintain social order in society in order to instill confidence in a person safety and a sense of social comfort. From the point of view of sociology, all of these are forms of manifestation of supposed spatial contacts.

Interest-related contacts people are more complex level of interaction. These contacts are conditioned by the clearly “targeted” needs of individuals. If you meet an outstanding football player while visiting, then you may experience a sense of simple curiosity as a famous person. But if there is a business representative in the company, and you are looking for a job with a degree in economics, then in your mind there immediately arises a need for a contact where there is interest. Here, the actualized motive and interest is caused by the presence of a need - to make an acquaintance and, perhaps, find a good job with its help. This contact can continue, or it can suddenly break off if you lose interest in it.

If motive - this is a direct urge to activity associated with the need to satisfy a need, then interest - it is a conscious form of manifestation of a need, which ensures the orientation of the individual to a certain activity. Before you went to visit, you asked a friend to help you find a job: introduce you to a businessman, give a good characterization, vouch for your reputation, etc. It is possible that in the future this friend, in turn, will ask you to help him in something.

AT exchange contacts social interaction becomes more complex. This is a kind of contact, during which individuals are interested not so much in people as in objects of exchange - information, money, etc. For example, when you buy a movie ticket, you are not interested in the cashier, you are interested in the ticket. On the street, you stop the first person you meet in order to figure out how to get to the station, and least of all you pay attention to whether this person is old or young, handsome or not very, the main thing is to get an answer to your question. The life of a modern person is filled with such exchange contacts: he buys goods in the store and in the market; pays for tuition, goes to a disco, after having done a haircut in a hairdresser; a taxi takes him to the specified address. In modern society, exchange contacts are becoming more and more complicated. For example, wealthy parents send their daughter to a prestigious educational institution in Europe, believing that in exchange for the money they pay, the employees of the educational institution will take upon themselves all the worries related to the socialization, upbringing and education of their daughter.

Thus, under social contact is understood as a short-term initial stage of interaction between individuals or social groups. Social contact, as a rule, appears in the forms of spatial contact, psychic contact and exchange contact. Social contacts are the first step in the formation of social groups. The study of social contacts makes it possible to find out the place of each individual in the system of social ties, his group status. By measuring the number and direction of social contacts, the sociologist can determine the structure of social interactions and their nature.

Social actions

- the next level of complex social relationships after contacts. The concept of "social action" is considered one of the central in sociology and is the simplest unit of any kind of human behavior. The concept of "social action" was introduced into sociology and scientifically substantiated by M. Weber. He considered a social action “a person's action (regardless of whether it is external or internal, whether it comes down to non-intervention or patient acceptance) ... which, according to the sense assumed by the actor or actors, is related to the action others people and focuses on him. "

Weber proceeded from the fact that social action is a deliberate action and clearly oriented towards others. For example, a collision between two cars may be nothing more than an accident, but an attempt to avoid this collision, abuse that followed, an escalating conflict between drivers or a peaceful settlement of the situation, attraction of new parties (traffic police, emergency commissioner, insurance agent) is already a social action.

A well-known difficulty is the drawing of a clear boundary between social actions and asocial (natural, natural). According to Weber, suicide will not be a social action if its consequences do not influence the behavior of acquaintances or relatives of the suicide.

Fishing and hunting are not social activities in themselves, if they do not correlate with the behavior of other people. This interpretation of actions - some as non-social and others as social - is not always justified. So, suicide, even if we are talking about a lonely person living outside social contacts, is a social fact. If we follow the theory of social interaction by P.A. Sorokin, then any phenomenon that occurs in society cannot be isolated from it and characterizes, first of all, the given society (in this case, suicide acts as a social indicator of society's unwell). It is very difficult to determine the presence or absence of awareness in a particular act of an individual. According to Weber's theory, actions cannot be considered social if the individual acted under the influence of affect - in a state of anger, irritation, fear. However, as studies of psychologists show, a person never acts fully consciously, his behavior is influenced by various emotions (likes, dislikes), physical condition (fatigue or, conversely, a feeling of uplift), character and mental organization (temperament, optimistic mood of the choleric or phlegmatic pessimism), culture and intelligence, etc.

Unlike social contacts, social action is complex. The following components are distinguished in the structure of social action:

the individual who acts
the individual's need for a specific action
purpose of action
action method,
another individual to whom the action is directed
the result of the action.

The mechanism of social action was most fully developed by the American sociologist T. Parsons ("The Structure of Social Action"). Like Sorokin, Parsons considered interaction to be the basic process that makes possible the development of culture at the level of an individual. The result of interaction is social behavior. A person, joining a certain community, follows the cultural patterns accepted in this community. The mechanism of social action includes need, motivation and action itself. As a rule, the beginning of a social action is the emergence of a need that has a certain direction.

For example, a young man wants to learn how to water a car. The motivation to take an action is called motivation. The motives of social action can be different: in this case, a young man either wants to distract his girlfriend from a rival who drives a car well, or he likes to take his parents to the country, or he wants to get additional income as a "cab".

In performing social actions, the individual experiences the influence of others and himself, in turn, wants to influence others. This is how the exchange of actions takes place, which acts as a social interaction. In this process, an important role belongs to the system of mutual expectations, which makes it possible to assess the behavior of a given individual from the point of view of generally accepted norms.

Imagine that, being in a company, a young man met a girl and they made an appointment. Each of them has a system of expectations of behavior accepted in society or a given group. A girl can consider a young man as a potential groom, so it is important for her to establish a strong relationship, consolidate an acquaintance, find out everything about his outlook on life, interests and affections, his profession, material opportunities. The young man, in turn, also thinks about the upcoming meeting either in earnest or as another adventure.

The meeting can take place in different ways. One will drive up in a foreign car and invite you to a restaurant, followed by a drive to an empty dacha. Another will suggest going to the movies or just walking in the park. But it is possible that the first young man will soon disappear, and the timid young man will receive a diploma, enter the service, and become a respectable husband.

Forms of social interactions

Mutual expectations are often not met, and the resulting relationships are destroyed. If mutual expectations are justified, they acquire a predictable, and most importantly, stable form, such interactions are called social relations. Sociology distinguishes between three most general types of interactions - cooperation, rivalry, and conflict.

Cooperation - a type of interaction in which people carry out interrelated actions to achieve common goals. Typically, cooperation is beneficial for the interacting parties. Common interests unite people, evoke feelings of sympathy and gratitude in them. Mutual benefit encourages people to communicate in an informal setting, contributes to the emergence of an atmosphere of trust, moral comfort, the desire to yield in a dispute, to suffer some inconvenience for oneself, if it is necessary for the case. Cooperative relationships have many benefits and rewards for doing business together, fighting off competitors, increasing productivity, keeping employees in an organization, and preventing employee turnover.

However, over time, cooperative interaction begins to acquire a conservative character. People, having studied each other's capabilities, character traits, imagine what should be expected in a particular situation from each. Elements of routine appear, the stability of relations becomes stagnant, gives rise to the need to maintain the status quo. Group members become afraid of change and do not want it. They already have a set of standard, time-tested solutions in almost any situation, have established relationships with the entire system of multilateral relations in society, know their suppliers of raw materials, informants, designers, representatives of government agencies. There is no way for newcomers to the group, new ideas do not penetrate this blocked social space. The group begins to degrade.

Rivalry Interaction (competition) is one of the most common types of interaction, the opposite of cooperation. The peculiarity of rivalry is that people have the same goals, but pursue different interests. For example, several companies are applying for an order to build a large bridge across the Volga. They have the same goal - to get an order, but their interests are different. Two young people love one girl, they have one goal - to achieve her favor, but the interests are opposite.

Rivalry, or competition, is the basis of market relations. In this struggle for income, feelings of hostility, anger towards the opponent, hatred, fear arise, as well as the desire to get ahead of him at all costs. The victory of one person often means a disaster for the other, the loss of prestige, good work, and welfare. Envy of a successful rival can be so strong that a person commits a crime - he hires murderers to eliminate a rival, steals the necessary documents, i.e. goes to the conflict. Such cases are quite common, they are widely represented in the literature (T. Dreiser, J. Galsworthy, V. Ya. Shishkov and other writers), they are written about in newspapers, and they are discussed on television. The most effective means of limiting this kind of competition is the adoption and implementation of appropriate laws and the appropriate education of a person. In economics, this is the adoption of a series of antitrust laws; in politics - the principle of separation of powers and the presence of opposition, free press; in the sphere of spiritual life - the dissemination of the ideals of kindness and mercy, universal human moral values \u200b\u200bin society. However, the spirit of competition is an incentive in business and, in general, in any work, which does not allow a person to calm down on what he has achieved.

- open, direct confrontation, sometimes armed. In the latter case, we can talk about a revolution, an armed uprising, a riot, and mass riots. For example, after the riots that engulfed Chisinau in 2009 and Bishkek in 2010, a change of government took place in Moldova and Kyrgyzstan. It is the responsibility of the state to prevent violent conflicts, struggles that harm humans and disrupt public order. Studying the problem of social interaction, sociologists, in particular T. Parsons, developed the theory of equilibrium of the social system, which acts as a decisive condition for the preservation of the system, its viability. A system is stable or is in relative equilibrium if the relationship between its structure and the processes occurring within it, and between it and the environment are such that the properties and relationships are unchanged.

However, there is another view, which explains the conflict not only as a negative, but also as a positive element of social life.

In this way, social action is such a person's action that correlates with the actions of other people and is guided by them. Social action is a constituent element, a "unit" of social reality. Many sociologists (for example, M. Weber, T. Parsons) saw in him the starting point of the entire system of social relations. Sustained and systematic performance of actions that imply feedback is called social interaction. Social interaction is usually expressed in the form of cooperation, rivalry, or conflict.

The problem of social interactions is most thoroughly considered in symbolic interactionism, the theory of social exchange and phenomenology. The main provisions of the theory of social interactions are as follows.

Social interaction is one of the types of social connection - a mutually directed process of exchange of social actions between two or more individuals.

The connection is always mutual, available and feasible (at least in the imagination).

there is two types of ties: direct (usually visual, interpersonal) and mediated (when communication is carried out through intermediaries; in this case, the phenomenon of deindividualization arises - the illusion that all social relations exist independently of the will and desire of people).

Relationship types:

1) social contact (single or regular) - a connection of a superficial, fleeting nature in the absence of conjugate (interdependent, interdependent) actions of partners in relation to each other (you asked a passerby: "How to get to the pharmacy?"; You regularly go to the bakery and contact the seller);

2) social interaction (interactionism) - systematic, fairly regular social actions of individuals, directed at each other and with the goal of causing a well-defined response from the partner. In this case, the response gives rise to a new reaction of the influencing person (that is, a system of actions of partners in relation to each other arises).

Social interaction traits:

1) the conjugation of the actions of both partners;

2) renewability of actions;

3) sustained interest in the partner's response;

4) coordination of partners' actions.

Types of social interactions:

1) rigid exchange (exchange on the basis of certain agreements (most often in the economic sphere, in the manager-subordinate relationship, in political life));

2) diffuse (non-rigid) exchange (mainly in moral and ethical interactions: friendship, neighborhood, parent-child relationship, partnership);

3) direct-indirect interactions (direct - direct (bilateral) interactions between individuals, indirect - complex, mediated through 3-4 persons (in modern society, indirect interactions prevail));

4) individual-group interactions (individual-individual, individual-group, group-group).

I. Goffman, within the framework of a phenomenological perspective, offers a slightly different view of social interactions. To analyze them, he uses a "dramatic approach" based on the premise that individuals are actors playing social roles. Accordingly, interaction is a "performance", "acting", constructed by the actor with the aim of "making an impression" in accordance with his goals. The actions of the actor, according to I. Goffman, correspond to the concept of "presenting oneself and managing the impression." "Presentation of oneself" includes gestures, intonations, clothes, with the help of which an individual seeks to make a certain impression on a partner, to evoke one or another reaction from him. At the same time, the individual in the process of interaction, as a rule, provides only selected, partial information about himself, seeking to control the impression he makes on others.

P. Blau, relying on the theory of exchange and structural functionalism, argues that not all social interactions can be considered as processes of exchange. The latter include only those that are focused on achieving goals, the realization of which is possible only in the process of interacting with other people and for the achievement of which means available to other people are needed. That part of human behavior that is governed by the rules of exchange lies at the basis of the formation of social structures, but the rules of exchange themselves are insufficient to explain the complex structures of human society.

Nevertheless, it is social exchange that largely determines the interactions of each individual. The success or failure of our interactions ultimately depends on knowledge and ability (or ignorance and inability) to practically use the principles of their regulation, formulated within the framework of the exchange theory.

77lian lectures:

1. Social connections and relationships, their system-forming role.

2. The concepts of social action and interaction as an expression of the dynamic characteristics of social structure.

3. Theories of social interaction (interaction).

1. In the preceding topics, the analysis of the social structure was associated with the identification of its main components, which are: a person (personality), family, group, collective, community, organization and institution. Identification of these components helps to understand the nature of the "material" from which the social structure is formed. However, these elements do not represent some kind of inert scattered material. Each element of the social structure is an example of a living, active, self-organizing and self-developing system that has internal and external links, functions and relationships, thanks to which the structure of society acquires a living, dynamic character. Therefore, the analysis of a social structure presupposes the identification of not only its components, but also those connections, due to which this structure takes the form of a living, functioning, developing system. This side of the social structure is expressed by such concepts as "connection", "interconnection", "attitude", "action", "interaction", which reveal the mechanisms of social functioning, change and development. Let's consider these concepts in more detail.

Let's start with the most general concept, which is the concept of communication. This concept means combining the elements of the system into a single, holistic formation. Systems, as already noted, are subdivided into simple and complex, static and dynamic, organic and inorganic, natural and social. Any object of nature, society or technology is a complex connection of its constituent elements.

If we are talking about technical systems - machines and units, then it is obvious that there are, on the one hand, individual parts that make up the unit, and on the other, the elements connecting them (bolts, nuts, welding, gluing, cementing, etc.) etc.). With the same obviousness, this connection appears in biological objects, i.e. in living organisms, which consist of individual organs and their connecting elements (joints, tendons, muscles, etc.). From this point of view, society is no different from the listed

systems, it also represents a kind of organism with many elements interconnected. Just as a group of climbers is literally tied with a safety rope, so people in society are in a kind of connection with each other. True, this connection is special, it is not always amenable to direct observation. But it does exist and must be taken into account when it comes to social structure.

So what is social connection? In the most general terms, we can say that social connection is the connecting elements of the social structure that ensure the unity and systemic integrity of social objects from the family and group to society, the state and humanity as a whole.

Society as an integral system is a complex combination of various types of connections between its constituent elements. These are, first of all, economic ties, which, in turn, break down into production, financial, trade, consumer, etc. In addition, class-political, legal, cultural, technical and other ties are distinguished, which make up the complex structure of social relations. In the broadest sense of the word, all these connections can be called social. But there is a special type of social relations that has a proper social meaning - these are relations that develop between people in a family, in a neighbor's or friend's collective, in a production brigade, in a student group, in a military unit, in a sports team, in a crowd, in a national or racial association, in a religious community, in an estate clan, in an age cohort, etc.

In this regard, social connection acts as a set of special dependencies of some social subjects on others, their mutual relations, which unite people in the corresponding social communities and associations.

The basis for the formation of social connection is direct contact between people in one or another primary social community (family, group, brigade), which then develops into a wider mediated connection of people who make up large social associations, within which feelings of belonging to a group or intragroup solidarity are formed (within, for example, nation, class, estate, confession, etc.).

There is a certain set of factors that determine the nature of social ties. These factors are subdivided into natural-biological, psychological-rational and social-institutional. Natural and biological ones are set by hereditary characteristics, i.e. the very fact of the birth of a person that op-

reduces its ethnic, national or racial characteristics, and at the same time the nature of the connecting elements.

Among the factors that unite people into appropriate groups and communities, phenomena of a psychological nature, such as, for example, a sense of community with other people, are of great importance. On the basis of the feeling of such a community, a feeling of love, affection, passion, trust, recognition of authority, altruism, concern for one's neighbor or the weak, etc., is born, which allows individuals to become an element of an integral system that functions according to their own laws.

Social ties reach their highest manifestation when they become convictions, acquire the character of rational attitudes, which reflect the traditions, norms and ideals that have developed in society.

If the latter emerge in society spontaneously, defining the socio-cultural code of social development, then institutional norms are specially created (formal, written) rules (norms) that regulate social ties and relations in a special way, determining the order of action of social objects within a social institution and controlling them.

Considering all these factors, we can say that social connections are formal and informal, personal and collective, direct and indirect, stronger and less durable, direct and inverse, probabilistic and correlational, etc.

The subjects of social ties are not only individuals, but also their associations: family, group, collective, community, institution, etc., which also enter into complex relationships with each other. In this regard, we can talk about the connections between city and countryside, between education and culture, between philosophy and religion, between science and technology, between supporters of different confessions, about neighbors, business, friendship and other ties.

Social connection between individuals is realized as communication. Communication involves contacts. The latter have a physical and spiritual form of their manifestation. Physical contact is realized in such actions as shaking hands, kissing, hugging, performing conjugal functions, physical punishment, etc., that is, it is realized as a physical impact of one person on another. Physical contact is also realized in the cohabitation of family members, in the joint performance of work duties within the primary labor collective, in joint participation in political and social actions, etc. 156

The spiritual form of contact is a sensory and emotional coloring of physical connections and then itself acts as a prerequisite for productive connections between people. A positive spiritual coloring strengthens social ties, a negative one destroys them.

Language acts as a special bonding material, which accompanies both physical and spiritual forms of contact. Given the technical possibilities of transferring linguistic and figurative information, it can be considered that the framework of direct communication is expanding significantly, acquiring a truly planetary and even cosmic character.

Considering the fact that in society, connections are not unidirectional, but bi-directional, they are often expressed using the concept of "interconnection", which expresses the mutual influence of objects on each other, their mutual conditioning. Reasoning schematically, we can say that A acts on B and B acts on A.

Within the framework of the constant functioning of the social system, social connection and interconnection acquire the character of a social relation, i.e. a person is not just connected with another person, but in a certain way relates to this person, evaluating him from a positive or negative side. For example, such a connection as friendship presupposes the need for direct physical and verbal contacts, i.e. is realized in the desire to meet, exchange news, play any games, etc., which ultimately leaves a pleasant impression. In the consciousness, however, friendship is preserved as a kind attitude of one person to another, as mutual respect, as confidence in the repetition of such contacts and the hope of help in difficult periods of life. The service relationship between managers and subordinates is also expressed by the concept of attitude, they speak of service relationships - formal or informal. Their relations are established between communities, institutions and organizations, in this case they talk about industrial relations, class relations, party relations, interfaith relations, etc.

Thus, the concepts of social connection, social relationship and social relationship mutually presuppose and complement each other. Sometimes their meanings are so closely related that they are used interchangeably. Meanwhile, they have their own distinctive features. If the concepts of connection and interconnection denote the harmonious integrity of a social object, then the concept of relationship has both positive and negative meanings. Some relationships strengthen, integrate the social system, while others

are negative, disintegrate the system. These are relations of friendship and enmity, love and hatred, altruism and selfishness, peacefulness and aggression, tolerance (tolerance) and intolerance, equality and inequality, obedience and disobedience, etc. Therefore, we can say that the concept of social relations expresses the qualitative aspect of social ties. Thus, objective connections, interconnections and relations act as that rallying, cementing force that unites individual elements of society into integral social systems.

The concepts of connection, interconnection and relationship, in addition, are closely related to the concepts of law and regularity. Considering the fact that connections are essential and insignificant, internal and external, general and private, accidental and necessary, repetitive and non-repetitive, it is possible to single out those of them that allow us to formulate the concept of law, including the social law. Such is the expression of a universal, necessary, essential connection between objects, phenomena and processes that reveal the functioning, change and development of social systems.

If a law expresses the deep essence of social phenomena and processes, then the concept of regularity reveals its external, empirically fixed form of manifestation.

Of the two types of laws (dynamic and statistical) in the description of social phenomena, the latter prevail, since when studying social processes and phenomena, one most often has to deal with mass objects, using statistical calculations and probabilistic inferences.

The concept of social connection has become one of the main categories of sociology. With its help, experts even tried to determine the specifics of the very subject of this science. Thus, O. Comte tried to present the social structure (statics) as a complex organism in which special connections are established from the family to the systems of religion and the state. Another founder of positivism, G. Spencer, tried to deduce the specifics of the militaristic and industrial types of society through an analysis of the system of social ties.

Representatives of psychological trends (for example, V. Pareto) saw the basis of social connections in the structure of instincts. E. Durkheim, seeking to classify the types of ties, singled out mechanical and organic solidarity as peculiar stages in the development of society from its traditional forms to industrial society with its special manifestation of the division of labor.

Supporters of formal sociology, based on the identification of different types of social ties, also sought to derive various types of unification of people and show their evolution from community to society.

This interest itself emphasizes the great meaning and categorical significance of the concept of social connection, without which it is generally impossible to form an idea of \u200b\u200bhow human society works, how it functions and develops.

2. Describing further the nature of social ties, it should be noted that they are based on social actions and interactions. The latter are interpreted in sociological literature as a manifestation of human activity aimed at changing behavior, attitudes, and the value system of an individual, group or community. So, M. Weber believed that sociology is a science that seeks to understand social actions and interactions and thereby causally explain social processes. At the same time, he calls social actions such actions that contain a subjective meaning and are focused on the actions of other people, i.e. interaction of subjects of social action is assumed.

In T. Parsons's theory, social action is viewed as a system in which the following elements are distinguished:

Actor (actor or subject of action);

Object (individual or community to which the action is directed);

The purpose of the action;

Mode of action;

The result of the action (reaction of the object).

Bearing in mind the fact that the result of an action does not remain independent in relation to the actor, but in a certain way affects him, social action also expands its meaning to the concept of interaction, often referred to as interaction.

Interaction begins at the level of two individuals (a kind of interaction atom) as carriers of social statuses, it can also manifest itself as the interaction of an individual with a group or community, and at the macro level as an interaction of social communities, institutions and states.

Thus, social interaction consists of separate acts, called social actions, and includes statuses (range of rights and obligations), roles, social relations, symbols and meanings (Kravchenko A.I .; General Sociology. - M., 2001.-S. 205).

Specifically, interaction in society is manifested as cooperation, competition and rivalry. It can be associated with conflict situations and reasonable methods of resolving them.

Connections, relationships, actions and interactions are direct and mediated. It is the presence of the latter that makes it possible to consider all connections and relations (even such as production, and even more so political) as social relations, and by no means only those that are built in exchange. For even when a person chops wood in the summer, and in this action, it would seem, there is nothing social, in fact, deep social meaning is hidden in it. a person takes care of his household, about their life in winter conditions. Therefore, social action cannot be regarded only as an act of direct interaction (interaction) of two individuals, it manifests itself in any action, the meaning of which is determined by the laws of coexistence. However, the analysis of interaction helps to reveal the internal mental mechanisms of social action and thereby show its human significance, the analysis of which is the main task of sociology.

Social actions and interactions seem to be so significant for the study of social structure that it is through them that the essence and subject of sociology as a science is determined. So, M. Weber believes that sociology is a science striving, interpreting, to understand social action and thereby causally explain its process and impact (Weber M. Selected Works. -M, 1990.-S. 602).

Similarly, the subject of sociology is defined by P. Sorokin, who believes that sociology studies the phenomena of interaction of people with each other, on the one hand, and the phenomena arising from this process of interaction, on the other.

3. Theories of social interaction (interaction) developed mainly within the framework of American sociological thought, in which the ideas of utilitarianism, pragmatism and behaviorism were strong. The behaviorist principle of "stimulus-response" was given a broad sociological meaning. Stimulus and reaction began to be considered in the aspect of human action and interaction, when one person (or group), acting on another, expects a certain positive reaction from the latter. The classical theories of this direction include the theory of the "mirror self", symbolic interactionism and the theory of exchange. Let's consider them in more detail.

The theory of the "mirror self".The founder of this theory is the American sociologist and social psychologist Charles Cooley (1864 -1929), who in his works "Human Nature and Social Order", "Social Organization", "Social Process", "Sociological Theory and Social Research" outlined his vision of social structure, the essence of which is well expressed in a poetic line from the work of Goethe: "Only in people can you know yourself." From the point of view of this author, society, group and individual are united into a kind of super-wholeness. Society and the individual are not parts of the whole, but different sides, different manifestations of the whole. Society is a cumulative (and not summative) aspect of integrity, an individual is a discrete essence of the whole. As the ancients said - everything is in small and small in everything.

The integrity of a society, a group and an individual is determined by such metaphysical concepts as "big consciousness", "human life", "social integrity", "social self".

An important system-forming category is the exchange of consciousness (information) between individuals. This exchange is achieved in the process of socialization of an individual within a small group, i.e. such a group in which direct contact between people is realized. This is, first of all, a family, a neighborhood community, within which a person begins to form with his subsequent inclusion in various social structures (organizations and institutions).

In the process of socialization, the transformation of individual consciousness into a collective mind takes place with the assimilation of social norms and a reassessment of one's personality from the standpoint of perception by others, i.e. the transition from intuitive "self-awareness" to "social feelings" is carried out. A person looks at another person, as in a special mirror, and sees his own reflection in it.

Moreover, this reflection does not always coincide with a person's own assessment. Socialization, according to Ch. Cooley, means the need to harmonize assessment and self-assessment, the transformation of the individual "I" into a collective "I". Hence it follows that the individual nature of a person acquires a social meaning only in communication, in interpersonal circulation within the primary group. The “social self” is the mental element that passes through specific people from society to the personality, integrating it into the social structure, transforms the personal “I” into the social “I”. In this case, a special role is assigned to the feeling of "appropriation", which is realized in a person's life from the elementary appropriation of things (as objects of property) to

appropriation of mental objects, i.e. appropriating other people's opinions about yourself. In this regard, Ch. Cooley writes: “The self is manifested in the most noticeable way in the appropriation of objects of common desire to the corresponding individual need for power over such objects in order to ensure their own development, as well as the threat of opposition from other people who also feel the need for them. This applies not only to material objects, but also implies the desire to capture the attention and affection of other people in the same way. " And further this thought is expressed even more succinctly: "The feeling of appropriation is always, so to speak, a shadow of social life."

This appropriation by a person of the opinion of others about himself is the dominant part of his socialized "I", which determines the structure of the personality, its interaction with other people within the framework of the social self, within the framework of the primary social collective.

The peculiarity of direct interaction within a small group is that in it there is a "meeting" of individual and social consciousness, the individual "I" and "social self", moral norms and social traditions are born and transmitted. Considering the fact that the concept of “appropriation” turns out to be the key term in the theory of the “mirror I”, this theory could also be called the “theory of appropriation” by analogy with the theory of exchange. The main ideas of this idea were developed in the theories of symbolic interactionism.

Social interaction

Social interaction - a system of interdependent social actions linked by cyclical dependence, in which the action of one subject is both a cause and a consequence of the response actions of other subjects. It is related to the concept of "social action", which is the starting point for the formation of social ties. Social interaction as a way of implementing social ties and relationships presupposes the presence of at least two subjects, the interaction process itself, as well as the conditions and factors for its implementation. In the course of interaction, the formation and development of the individual, the social system, their change in the social structure of society, etc., takes place.

Social interaction includes the transfer of action from one social actor to another, receiving and responding to it in the form of a response, as well as the renewal of actions of social actors. It has a social meaning for the participants and involves the exchange of their actions in the future due to the presence in it of a special causality - a social relationship. Social relations are formed in the process of human interaction and are the result of their past interactions that have acquired a stable social form. Social interactions, in contrast to them, are not “frozen” social forms, but “living” social practices of people, which are conditioned, directed, structured, regulated by social relations, but are capable of influencing these social forms and changing them.

Social interaction is determined by the social statuses and roles of the individual and social groups. It has objective and subjective sides:

Objective side - factors that are independent of interacting, but influencing them.
Subjective side - the conscious attitude of individuals to each other in the process of interaction, based on mutual expectations.

Classification of social interaction

Primary, secondary (ideological, religious, moral)
By the number of participants: interaction of two people; one person and a group of people; between the two groups
Multi-ethnic
Between people of different incomes, etc.

The concepts of society and system, social ties, social interaction, social relations. Social connections and interactions Social interactions of people in society

Social interactions of people in society

Social contacts

Social actions

Forms of social interactions

Classification of social interaction

Notes

see also

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