Interactionism is a generic sociological perspective that brings under its umbrella a number of subperspectives: Social interactions of people and their consequences are the subject of sociology studies. ...

• phenomenology
• ethnomethodology
• Symbolic interactionism (social psychology)

"Interactionism" is an American sociological current that analyzes the social interaction. George Herbert Mead, as an advocate of pragmatism and the subjectivity of social reality, is regarded as being at the origin of this development. Look up Phenomenology in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Phenomenology is a current in philosophy that takes intuitive experience of phenomena (what presents itself to us in conscious experience) as its starting point and tries to extract the essential features of experiences and the essence of what we experience. ... Ethnomethodology (literally, the study of peoples methods) is a sociological discipline which focuses on the way people make sense of the world and display their understandings of it. ... Symbolic interactionism is a sociological perspective which examines how individuals and groups interact, focusing on the creation of personal identity through interaction with others. ... Social psychology is the study of the nature and causes of human social behavior, with an emphasis on how people think towards each other and how they relate to each other. ... George Herbert Mead (February 27, 1863 - April 26, 1931) was a United States philosopher, sociologist and psychologist, who did much of his work at the University of Chicago as one of the founding members of the pragmatist school. ...

The social interaction is a face-to-face process consisting of actions, reactions, and mutual adaptation between two or more individuals. The interaction includes all language (including body language) and mannerisms. The goal of the social interaction is to communicate with others. If the interaction is in danger of ending before one intends it to, it can be conserved by conforming to the others' expectations, by ignoring certain incidents or by solving apparent problems. Erving Goffman underlines the importance of control in the interaction. One must attempt to control the others' behaviour during the interaction, in order to attain the information one is seeking and in order to control the perception of one's own image. Important concepts in the field of interactionism include the "social role" and Goffman's "presentation of self". Erving Goffman (June 11, 1922 - November 19, 1982), was a Canadian sociologist and writer. ...

In the philosophy of mind, the position labeled interactionism is a form of property dualism, which in turn is a form of emergent materialism. Philosophy of mind is the philosophical study of the nature of the mind, mental events, mental functions, mental properties, and consciousness. ... Property dualism is a philosophy of mind, and a subbranch of emergent materialism. ... Emergent materialism asserts that we will never understand the mechanism of emergence: it will always seem to us like emergence is magical. ...

See also

• Important publications in Interactionism