Trivialization and detrivialization in cancer research : knowing, unknowing and meta-knowing : a discursive psychology study
(2016)
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- Authors
- Supervisors
- Lambotte, François
- Abstract
- Within the framework of Organizational Communication, there is an increasing interest in Knowledge and knowing that will not soon fade (Kuhn 2014). In line with this interest, the present research used the method of Discursive Psychology (Potter & Wetherell, 1987), aiming at studying trivialization in an organizational context, as a strategy to know about knowing. The cancer research lab, which is par excellence a knowledge building organization, was targeted for our case study. Starting from Latour & Woolgar (1979)’s description of how scientific facts are “sociologically (rather than logically) determined”, and building on a number of diverse studies describing ‘pitfalls’ of knowledge building (Groupthink (Janis, 1971 and Whyte, 1952); Cognitive dissonance (Festinger, 1957 and 1962); and Simon, Greenberg & Brehm (1995)’s studies of trivialization as a mode of dissonance reduction), our research used Garfinkel (1967)’s breaching experiment as a technique to open black-boxed scientific facts and examined the trivializations they encompass. Through participant observation, we ultimately singled out 3 trivialization cases. Semi structured interviews and discourse analysis were conducted to understand the dynamic of trivialization around the 3 cases. The study was then able to describe how such scientific matters happen to be trivialized, at three levels: a) (inter)organizationally (as standardized research practices); b) individually (as discursively practiced during our individual interviews); and c) in group (as discursively practiced during our collective interview). The research was able to outline the consequences of the studied trivializations on cancer research, considering their transposibility to other labs. It also detailed the outcomes of the detrivialization triggered by our research (detrivialization is a neologism we proposed to refer to the deconstruction of trivialization). Finally, the research suggested that studying (de)trivialization can be an effective strategy to know about knowing.
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Citations
Mnasri, S. (2016). Trivialization and detrivialization in cancer research : knowing, unknowing and meta-knowing : a discursive psychology study. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/45007