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This chapter is a revised and reduced version of Salvatore, S., Mannarini and colleagues (2018). Globalization, demand of sense and enemization of the other. A psycho-cultural analysis of European societies’ socio-political crisis. Culture & Psychology.; International audience; This chapter will deal with an interpretation of the current socio-political European scenario (populism, raise of ultra-right parties, Brexit) in the light of the cultural analysis provided in the previous chapters. The main thesis that will be discussed concerns the persecutory valence assumed by otherness and how such a semiotic process works as a device for satisfying a demand of “thinkability” of a context that is less and less cognitively graspable. On the other hand, symbolic universes are discussed in terms of their capability of working as semiotic capital, namely as cultural resource feeding civic and social development. In this perspective, the notion of “mentalization of the system” will be presented as a strategic perspective for dealing with a post-crisis scenario. The mentalization of the system consists of the embodied interiorization of the rule, i.e. the rule assumes the mental function of object of desire rather than limit to it (as it is now). This is possible once and as far as models of practices make the systemic rule (which is by definition abstract and impersonal) something that can be experienced as the mediator of desire (i.e. as the way through which the subject finds satisfaction to their demand of sense).

The article provides an analysis of the affective polarization of the public sphere, namely, the increasing momentum gained by affective sensemaking in the current socio-institutional scenario (e.g. raise of populism, distrust in democracy and spreading xenophobia). To this end, the Semiotic Cultural Psychology Theory (SCPT) is outlined. The SCPT focuses on the embodied micro-mechanisms bridging the intra- and inter-psychological levels of analysis of the semiotic dynamics. The article is composed of two parts. First, the SCPT is outlined in terms of its nine underlying tenets. Then, SCPT is used to frame an interpretation of the psycho-social dynamics underpinning the current socio-political scenario. Based on the SCPT model, the spread of affective sensemaking in current societal dynamics is interpreted as being due to the capacity of affects to work as semiotic stabilizers, enabling people to face the deep uncertainty fostered by the economic and political turmoil associated with globalization.

This chapter outlines five ideas that I have been working on for the last two decades through the dialogue with Jaan Valsiner and on the grounds of his semiotic, dynamic view of meaning: (A) abstraction - the need of general theories to model psychological phenomena, (B) emergence - meaning as coming from sensemaking, (C) dynamic holism - sensemaking requires to be modeled as a field dynamics, (D) affective semiosis - the affective grounds of sensemaking, and (E) abduction - idiographic and nomothetic knowledge are complementary, linked by abduction. In the conclusion, I will point out three main challenges drawing the future of cultural psychology: the formalization of semiotic dynamics, the bridge between functional and computational levels of analysis, and the development of a general theory of sociocultural change and intervention.

This chapter provides a cultural interpretation of the current scenario of socio-institutional crisis through the lens of SCPT. The analysis focuses on the recursive interplay between the socioeconomic transformations and the culturally framed way in which peoples make sense of them. At the core of the interpretation discussed in the chapter lies the recognition of the role played by affective sensemaking in the public domain – or the “affectivisation of the public sphere” according to the terms adopted. Several manifestations of this dynamics are analysed together with a general interpretation of it as the way broad segments of societies adapt to regulate semiotically the uncertainty fostered by socio-economic turmoil.

This chapter briefly outlines the three general ideas, drawn from SPCT, in terms of which the relation between culture and policy-making is conceptualised—cultural pluralism, the performativity of sensemaking and the relevance of semiotic capital. The cultural pluralism concept claims that the objective characteristics of reality—however one wants to intend objectivity—are unable to reduce fully the space of freedom that qualifies any subjective act of interpretation, and this makes any policy a plural space of interpretation. The performativity of sensemaking claims that generalised cultural meanings are reproduced over time and within social groups through the very fact of being enacted—namely, used as assumptions to ground beliefs, actions, and choices. The semiotic capital concept claims that cultural meanings fostering socio-political and civic development are a scarce resource, unevenly distributed within the society, and for this reason requiring to be the target of a strategic policy on culture. The three criteria are illustrated with the support of a case study; the conversion of a contentious monument into an open cultural artefact. This case enables us to highlight the relevance of the three tenets in concrete circumstances of policy-making.

Geoethics investigates the multifaceted implications of the Human-Earth interdependence and seeks to portray a general normative framework for promoting people acting ethically towards an environment facing the current anthropogenic global change. Drawing on the Semiotic Cultural Psychological Theory that acknowledges a dynamic notion of culture, this chapter aims to delve into such a fruitful issue contending that the way people respond to the quest for responsible action towards Earth is culturally entrenched. Culture is presented as an ongoing process of sense-making in-between the personal and the social spheres through which individuals interpret their experience. Indeed, three central tenets of the cultural embeddedness of the human experience are discussed: cultural variability, otherness and performativity. According to these premises, the concept of semiotic capital is introduced to describe how social actors can confront their life-in-society in systemic terms valuing the interdependence between the personal and the public sphere. In particular, the likelihood of making ethical action possible would depend on the extent to which individuals interiorise and experience the systemic aspect of life as a vital dimension, namely on the amount of semiotic capital they have access to. Finally, a means for a policy that aims to promote a commitment to sustainability is delineated.

This chapter outlines the Semiotic Cultural Psychology Theory (SCPT). SCPT defines culture as the dynamics of sensemaking enacted by a social group defined by common participation in a given environment (e.g. a territory, a system of action, a communication setting). Such a dynamics of sensemaking is channelled by embodied, generalised, affect-laden meaning (Symbolic Universes, according to the SCPT terminology) that are active within the cultural milieu. The SCPT view of culture leads us to focus on the processes of interpretations through which social actors shape, react and act upon the socio-political, institutional and economic reality as well as on the way the symbolic fields generated by these processes shape their form, in a recursive semiotic dynamic. Emphasis is placed on how the focus on the recursive linkage between sensemaking and symbolic fields enables us to go beyond the essentialist and descriptive view of the role of culture in society and economy as well as to bridge micro and macro levels of analysis.

In this chapter I show how important it is for psychology to recognize the semiotic and semantic valence of psychological constructs, and thus their embeddedness in common sense, which can be drawn from Smedslund’s criticism of the pseudo-empirical nature of psychological research. Smedslund has drawn a completely alternative scientific program—Psycho-logic—from this criticism. According to him, since psychological constructs are linked semantically, the function of psychology is to make the normative commonsensical meaning underpinned such linkages explicit. My thesis is that Psycho-logic is not the solution to the problem he identified. Indeed, it throws the baby (the possibility of empirical psychological knowledge) out with the bathwater (the problematic way empirical research is usually carried out). What is needed is a form of empirical research which is consistent with the semiotic nature of psychological phenomena. Accordingly, the second part of the paper proposes the view of psychological phenomena in terms of inherent formal (rather than efficient) causality and an approach to them based on the combination of dialectically abstract theory and abductive analysis of local phenomena.

This chapter outlines a qualitative meta-analysis of the analyses of the social representations of three variants of otherness (i.e., immigration, Islam, and LGBT people). The meta-analysis aimed at assessing the level of generalization of the latent semantic structures detected by first-level analyses with the purpose of testing two general hypotheses drawn from Semiotic Cultural Psychology Theory (Salvatore in Psychology in black and white. The project of a theory-driven science. InfoAge Publishing, Charlotte, NC, 2016; Valsiner in Culture in minds and societies. Foundations of cultural psychology. Sage, New Delhi, India, 2007). First, that the social representations of social objects are shaped by affective sense-making. Second, that the higher the degree of exposure to otherness conveyed by the specific object of the social representation, the more the salience of affective sense-making, hence its influence over social representation. The findings were consistent with both hypotheses. (a) The meta-interpretation of the semantic structures in terms of generalized affective meanings reached a high level of coverage: almost four out of five semantic structures identified by the first-level analyses were interpreted as a specimen of more general affect-laden, generalized meaning. (b) The salience of affective sense-making proved to be associated with the degree of exposure to otherness involved in each object. The more the object involved the exposure to otherness, the more similar the semantic structures were. These results suggest that the representation of a specific topic should be regarded as a local expression of the general cultural dynamics.

This chapter is an extended version of the paper: Salvatore et al. (2018a). Symbolic universes between present and future of Europe. First results of the map of European societies’ cultural milieu. PLoS ONE 13(1): e0189885. With respect to that work, the current chapter presents an extension of the levels of analysis (i.e. the detection of the lines of semiotic force) and a more comprehensive sample (i.e. the inclusion of Dutch and Danish subsamples).; International audience; The chapter reports the main findings of an analysis of cultural milieus of a sample of 11 European countries (Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Malta, Netherlands, Spain, United Kingdom). The analysis is based on a questionnaire (View of Context—VOC) applied to a sample built through a two-step procedure of post-hoc random selection from a broader dataset based on an online survey. According to the methodological framework outlined in the previous chapter, responses to the questionnaire were subjected to multidimensional analysis—a combination of Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Cluster Analysis. We identified three fundamental dimensions of meanings, interpreted as lines of semiotic forces comprising the semiotic field of European societies: Affective connotation of the world—foe versus friend; Direction of desire—passivity versus engagement; Form of demand—demand for systemic resources versus demand for community bond. Moreover, 5 symbolic universes were mapped. Each symbolic universe corresponds to a basic, embodied, affect-laden, generalized worldview: People in this study see the world as either (a) an ordered universe; (b) a matter of interpersonal bond; (c) a caring society; (d) consisting of a niche of belongingness; (e) a hostile place (others’ world).

This article proposes a reading of liminal transitions in semiotic terms; that is, as a byproduct of the dynamics of sensemaking consisting of how two components of meaning interact: the observable side of meaning ( Significance in Praesentia)—the rupture directly experienced by the interpreter—and a further generalized meaning—the semiotic scenario ( Significance in Absentia), which makes the lived experience interpretable. Due to its pre-semantic and affective nature, in the liminal hotspot the semiotic scenario keeps a certain version of the self alive, regardless of the changes occurring in the real world. The conditions that favor such dynamics are briefly outlined as well as some implications for theory, methodology, and intervention.

The two-stage semiotic model (TSSM) suggests that the basic dynamics of a psychotherapy process could be described in terms of alternation of two different processes aimed respectively at constraining patients’ meanings regulating experience and action (deconstructive process) and at supporting the elaboration of innovative meanings (constructive process). The present case study tests the specificity of each of these processes in terms of clinically relevant features detected at interpersonal, intrapsychical, and clinical levels. A 76-session good-outcome psychodynamic treatment was studied. The results enable constructive and deconstructive sessions to be differentiated in terms of interaction modalities and the patient's modalities of thinking. This is consistent with the TSSM hypothesis that the constructive and deconstructive sessions are composed of qualitatively different clinical processes.

According to Semiotic Dynamic Cultural Psychology Theory, symbolic universes denote affective-laden systems of assumptions that inform people’s identity as well as their thinking, acting and behaving. Given their affective nature, symbolic universes can be considered embodied forms of meanings that mould bodily activation. Along with results from previous transnational research that detected five main symbolic universes characterizing the cultural milieu of European societies-Ordered Universe, Interpersonal Bond, Caring Society, Niche of Belongingness, and Other’s world—this study aimed at addressing the embodied nature of symbolic universes. In particular, it explored the association between the symbolic universes and the level of exploration of a visual stimulus (a picture)—namely the amount of time dedicated to the peripheral regions of the visual stimulus. To this end, an eye-tracking paradigm was implemented in a study involving 29 (F = 15) participants (university students aged 20–23). The classification of each participant in terms of the most representative symbolic universe was carried out by means of the questionnaire designed for this purpose (VOC questionnaire). The research findings showed the association between the symbolic universes and level of exploration, in so doing suggesting that the symbolic universes may affect the spatial visual attention of individuals. Theoretical, methodological and practical implications of the study are discussed.

The analyses and discussions developed throughout the volume are based on the Semiotic Cultural Psychological Theory (SCPT). SCPT integrates relational psychoanalysis, Dynamic Systems Theory and pragmatic semiotics within the more general framework of socio-cultural psychology. SCPT conceives mental processes as ongoing dynamics of sensemaking. Sensemaking consists of processes of interpretation of the world that shape experience. These interpretation processes are guided by generalized, affect-laden meanings that reflect the cultural milieu and that work as basic intuitive assumptions about the world—what is and how it works—as a whole. SCPT adopts the term “symbolic universes” to denote such systems of assumptions. A symbolic universe is an affect-laden, pre-semantic meaning working as a basic, generalized assumption that shapes the experience of both the outer (i.e. the social and physical space) and inner environment (i.e., the experience of one’s body and feelings), namely, the embodied image sensemakers have of themselves and of their relation with the world. In their turn, a symbolic universe can be interpreted as the emergent effect of the interplay of a certain set of polarized, generalized embodied latent dimension of sense—defined “lines of semiotic force” by SCPT. This chapter outlines how symbolic universes and lines of semiotic force can be detected and the role they play in social development.

The Semiotic Cultural Psychological Theory [SCPT] makes it clear that changes in people’s behaviours, thoughts and feelings can be comprehended along with the implicit worldviews (e.g., symbolic universes, SU) characterizing their cultural milieu. SU comprise a set of attitudes, opinions and representations about the reality that are useful in explaining a wide range of facts, both personal and public. Based on SCPT, this chapter outlines a semiotic cultural psychological analysis of the vaccination hesitancy phenomenon in Italy with the ultimate goal of abductively inferring the symbolic universes grounding opinions and representations about this topic. A qualitative investigation through a focus group was carried out. 60 residents (F = 33) in the southern area of the Apulia region participated in group discussions that were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim and analyzed following a thematic approach. The findings showed that the participants’ opinions and representations revolved around a few key thematic dichotomies—e.g., chaos versus stability, unreliable information versus education, us versus them, social responsibility versus individual freedom. In general, the participants who accepted vaccination used a repertoire of symbolic resources that emphasized the value of membership in society, social responsibility and inter-individual cooperation, reflecting the SUs Ordered Universe and Caring Society. Diversely, the participants who rejected immunization capitalized on the symbolic resources characterizing the SUs Niche of Belongingness and Others’ World involving mistrust in institutions, faith in conspiracies and scepticism towards health experts.

The paper starts from the recognition of Bruner’s contribution to the development of psychological science. It is claimed here that to proceed in that direction requires the building of an analytical notion of meaning. This analytical notion should distinguish between meaning-making and sensemaking, namely between the processes of elaboration and use of meaning (meaning-making) and the processes that makes the meaning emerge to be lived as psychological reality (sense-making). In order to discuss this distinction, two main issues are addressed – the limit of the hypostatized view of meaning and the dynamics of presentification through which meaning is endowed with value of life. These two issues are complementary – together they push psychology to search for a theoretical and methodological framework where meaning can be investigated as an emergent psychological phenomenon, and not only taken for granted as a premise.

Objectives. The paper presents a method of content analysis framed within a semiotic and contextual model of the psychotherapy process as a situated dynamics of sensemaking: the Dynamic Mapping of the Structures of Content in Clinical Settings (DMSC). Design. DMSC is a system of content analysis focused on a generalized level of meaning,concerningbasicaspectsofthepatient’snarrative(e.g.,ifthenarrativeconcerns herself or other than herself). Method. The paper presents the result of the application of DMSC to an intensive single-case analysis (Katja). The method has been applied by judges to the transcripts of sessions and is aimed at identifying patterns of combinations (defined: Patterns of content) of the categories characterizing the patient’s narratives (pattern analysis approach) as well as at mapping the transition among these patterns (sequential analysis approach). Results. These results provide evidence of its construct validity. In accordance with the theoretical model grounding the method, we have found that: (a) DMSC provides a meaningful representation of the patient’s narratives in terms of Patterns of content; (b) the probability of transition among the Patterns of content have proved to be significantly associated with the clinical quality of the sessions. Conclusion. The DMSC has to be considered an attempt paving the way for further investigations aimed at developing a deeper understanding of the role played by the dynamics of sensemaking in the psychotherapy process.

This paper provides an analysis of a basic assumption grounding the clinical research: the ontological autonomy of psychotherapy-based on the idea that the clinical exchange is sufficiently distinguished from other social objects (i.e. exchange between teacher and pupils, or between buyer and seller, or interaction during dinner, and so forth). A criticism of such an assumption is discussed together with the proposal of a different epistemological interpretation, based on the distinction between communicative dynamics and the process of psychotherapy-psychotherapy is a goal-oriented process based on the general dynamics of human communication. Theoretical and methodological implications are drawn from such a view: It allows further sources of knowledge to be integrated within clinical research (i.e. those coming from other domains of analysis of human communication); it also enables a more abstract definition of the psychotherapy process to be developed, leading to innovative views of classical critical issues, like the specific-nonspecific debate. The final part of the paper is devoted to presenting a model of human communication--the Semiotic Dialogical Dialectic Theory--which is meant as the framework for the analysis of psychotherapy.

This paper provides a semiotic theory of the desire, as the core of the general view of sensemaking as the process producing the mind—rather than the process produced by the mind. As one can find in a dictionary, the desire is usually meant as the sense of passionate search or of waiting something, for the sake of acquiring, fulfilling, and accomplishing what is felt as required for satisfying our preferences and needs. I propose a different definition. According to it, the desire is not germane to seeking, willing, commitment, need, and so forth—rather, it is the embodied semiotic dynamic providing the condition for making the object being the target of the tension we are used to consider desire (and that in this article I will denote with the term “appetite”): we do not desire what we see; rather, we see what we desire. My thesis is that such a turn of focus enables the cultural psychology to better understand the micro-genesis of the appetite towards the object.

Psychotherapy process research nowadays is facing the need to make research evidence from different clinical approaches reciprocally commensurable. This seems possible through the design of general metatheoretical models of the clinical process that can both describe the clinical process and its working and pinpoint the dynamics regulating this process as well as the conditions that favour its functioning. This chapter outlines a semiotic and dynamic perspective in which the clinical process is conceived in terms of communicational dynamic field focusing on the ontological status of psychotherapy and the modelling of its basic modality of functioning. Finally, some methodological implications are outlined in terms of psychotherapy process modelling as a field phenomenon and strategies of knowledge building.

The work presents a psychodynamic, semiotic and dialogical model of affect and of the role it plays in sensemaking. The model is based on the following three general assumptions. A) Affective semiosis works in accordance to the dynamic unconscious which Freud conceptualized in terms of primary process. According to this interpretation, the unconscious is the mind’s homogenising way of functioning, which transforms every categorical relation into a relation of identity. B) Affect is the generalized, homogenising and absolutizing embodied basic intersubjective meanings according to which experience is interpreted. C) Affective semiosis performs both the grounding and regulative functions in sensemaking, orienting the way people interpret experience.

The authors propose a method for analyzing the psychotherapy process: discourse flow analysis (DFA). DFA is a technique representing the verbal interaction between therapist and patient as a discourse network, aimed at measuring the therapist- patient discourse ability to generate new meanings through time. DFA assumes that the main function of psychotherapy is to produce semiotic novelty. DFA is applied to the verbatim transcript of the psychotherapy. It defines the main meanings active within the therapeutic discourse by means of the combined use of text analysis and statistical techniques. Subsequently, it represents the dynamic interconnections among these meanings in terms of a ‘‘discursive network.’’ The dynamic and structural indexes of the discursive network have been shown to provide a valid representation of the patient-therapist communicative flow as well as an estimation of its clinical quality. Finally, a neural network is designed specifically to identify patterns of functioning of the discursive network and to verify the clinical validity of these patterns in terms of their association with specific phases of the psychotherapy process. An application of the DFA to a case of psychotherapy is provided to illustrate the method and the kinds of results it produces.

This work presents a dialogic model of psychotherapy (the Two-Stage Semiotic Model, TSSM) with discourse flow analysis (DFA) and a low-inferential method of analysis based on it. TSSM claims that in good-outcome psychotherapy, the patient’s system of meanings follows a U-shaped trend: First, it decreases, and then the dialog promotes new meanings. DFA represents a session’s dialog as a “discourse network” made by the associations for temporal adjacency between contents; then it studies the network’s dynamic properties. DFA has been applied to the textual corpus obtained from the verbatim transcript of a 15-session psy- chotherapy course. Findings are consistent with the hypotheses.

J. Valsiner, Series Editor's Introduction. B. Wagoner, Introduction: What is a Symbol? Part 1. Semiotic Foundations. A. Gillespie, The Intersubjective Nature of Symbols. G. Sonesson, Here Comes the Semiotic Species: Reflections on the Semiotic Turn in the Cognitive Sciences. S. Salvatore, C. Venuleo, The Unconscious as Symbol Generator: A Psychodynamic-Semiotic Approach to Meaning Making. A. Rosa, Commentary on Part 1: Are We Connected to the Matrix Machine? Cognition and Experience Figuring out What Reality is. Part 2. Transformations of Experience. B. Bradley, Experiencing Symbols. G. Obeyesekere, Deep Motivation and the Work of Culture in Christian Penitential Ecstasy. N. Mori, Remembering with Others: The Veracity of an Experience in the Symbol Formation Process. E. Abbey, Commentary on Part 2: Imagination and the Movement of Meaning. Part 3. Transformations through the Life Course. T. Zittoun, How Does an Object Become Symbolic? Rooting Semiotic Artifacts in Dynamic Shared Experiences. L. McCune, Developing Symbolic Abilities. J. Matthews, Scribble: The Development of Children's Mark Making. U. Muller, J. Carpendale, Commentary on Part 3: Some Reflections on the Development of Symbolic Abilities. Part 4. Transformations of Identity. D. Winther-Lindqvist, Symbolic Group Play and Social Identity. D. Holland, Symbolic Worlds in Time/Spaces of Practice: Identities and Transformations. S. Arrigg Koh, From Stigma and Coping to Social Repositioning: A New Perspective on HIV/AIDS, Identity and Human Rights. E. Aveling, F. Cornish, J. Oldmeadow, Diversity in Sex Workers' Strategies for the Protection of Social Identity: Content, Context and Contradiction. I. Kadianaki, H. Mahmoud, Commentary on Part 4: Identity and Social Reality: Formations and Transformations. B. Wagoner, Conclusion: Opening and Closing Symbolic Transformation.

This work presents a semiotic approach to the economy, underlining that any economic phenomena is at the same time a communicative act as it is contingent to sense-making. The article discusses this topic by focusing on a specific phenomenon studied by economics: the underground economy. It shows that the conceptualization of the underground economy in terms of sense-making processes offers a thought-provoking perspective for theoretical development. More in general, the discussion proposed makes it clear that in order to deepen our vision of economic phenomena in a more thoughtful and realistic way we need to rethink these phenomena as being reciprocally and circularly embedded in the semiotic flow of life. The economy is within sense-making and it is shaped by it; at the same time sense-making is within the economy, as its semiotic substance.

We propose a model of emotion grounded on Ignacio Matte Blanco’s theory of the unconscious. According to this conceptualization, emotion is a generalized representation of the social context actors are involved in. We discuss how this model can help to better understand the sensemaking processes. For this purpose we present a hierarchical model of sensemaking based on the distinction between significance—the content of the sign—and sense—the psychological value of the act of producing the sign in the given contingence of the social exchange. According to this model, emotion categorization produces the frame of sense regulating the interpretation of the sense of the signs, therefore creating the psychological value of the sensemaking.

This chapter outlines the implication of the Re.Cri.Re. analysis of European societies’ cultural milieu for policy-making. It is claimed the strategic need of carrying out policies of cultural development, as intended within the Re.Cri.Re. framework, a policy of cultural development is aimed at two main purposes: on the one hand, to define social practices that promote semiotic capital, namely the positive experience of institutions and more in general of the systemic rules; on the other hand, to introduce constraints on the opacification of the system, in order to reduce the deficit of sense it fuels. The chapter is dedicated to outline the purpose and the methodological framework of policies of cultural development as well as to present thirteen suggestions of possible actions of this kind. These suggestions target three broad domains: institutions, economy and vital worlds. In order to clarify the methodological tenets and the suggestion, a few stylized excerpts from case-studies examined during the Re.Cri.Re. project are provided.