Public Relations Research Annual

Volume 1

James E. Grunig, Larissa A. Grunig

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781136696299
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Public Relations
• Index: Business

The first volume of this series features reviews of research programs, original research reports, and social scientific, historical, critical and humanistic methodologies.

Part I
Research Reviews

Chapter 1
Breadth of Perspective: An Important Concept for Public Relations

Hugh M. Culbertson
Ohio University

This chapter argues that "breadth of perspective" is an important concept for public relations practice and research. The author first encountered the notion some 22 years ago in a sociological essay (Warshay, 1962). Recently it has served as a focus of his own research.

The first two sections of the chapter define breadth of perspective and discuss its role in several disciplines. A third section looks at its use in two sociological studies with public relations overtones. Then the author summarizes findings related to breadth of perspective in three of his own recent projects.

Definition

Warshay defined breadth of perspective as the variety of responses that one calls to mind before tackling a problem. He saw a perspective as a symbolic structure that an actor brings to situations. The structure was said to consist of meanings or concepts, ideas, and values in differing states of clarity and coherence. A perspective serves as a frame of reference in defining situations (Warshay, 1962).

In light of this and other literature that is noted later, it is suggested that a person's breadth of perspective can be high in approaching an issue or topic only if there is:

1. Awareness that more than one definition, stand, or conclusion is possible and is probably accepted as valid by significant persons or groups. In his classic definition of public, Herbert Blumer (1953) specified that members must confront an issue, disagree about how to define and deal with it, and discuss it (apparently leading to a recognition that differing views exist). Grunig and Hunt (1984) see this definition as consistent with their "behavior molecule" (pp. 143-145) concept for public relations planning.
2. Awareness that there are, in all probability, differences between one's own position or definition and that of other people. This would be defined as a moderate or low (at least, less than perfect or the highest possible) congruency in the coorientation model of Chaffee-McLeod (1968).
3. An inclination to take others' views into account, as well as one's own, in making communication decisions and carrying them out (Culbertson, 1983a).
4. Knowledge of arguments and ramifications that support viewpoints opposed to (or at least, different from) those to which one subscribes.

Review of Literature

In addition to its "home discipline" of sociology, the notion of breadth of perspective has shown up, as reported later, in the work of psychologists concerned with flexibile, adaptive cognitive behavior. Also, it has played a role in an innovative mass-communication study by Chaffee and Wilson (1977) on diversity of people's news agendas as well as in research on knowledge level (Edelstein, 1973), and on uncertainty as a motive to seek information (Blood, Becker, & Carey, 1984).

In the public relations area, Grunig and Hunt (1984) discussed four models of public relations practice in their recent text. They focused heavily on a "two-way symmetric" model (p. 41-43) that they regarded as at least the fourth step in the evolution of public relations. Practitioners have long spoken eloquently of public relations in this light, they suggested, but few have practiced in the two-way symmetric mode until quite recently.

Analytically, two-way symmetric public relations appears to involve operating in what Lee Thayer (1968) has called the diachronic mode. At base this involves:

1. Entering a transaction with some thought of knowledge, opinions, or behavior that one hopes to bring about in one or more transaction "partners."
2. Having a willingness and inclination to change objectives vis-a-vis these partners as one learns more about them and their contexts.
3. Having a willingness to change one's own beliefs and behavior as a result of what the partners do and say. In public relations terms, this often involves changing client policy or practice—striving to live right, as well as to let people know you live right, as spelled out in one definition of the public relations function (see Simon, 1980, p. 6).

This analysis clearly places a premium on recognition by a communications source that he or she probably has a definition that differs from that of receivers. Thus, breadth of perspective lurks beneath the surface of Thayer's definition.

Such lurking also exists in Grunig's (1976) information-systems theory. In particular, the concept of problem recognition has a high value when one recognizes uncertainty with regard to a conclusion or decision. This, in turn, seems to imply a recognition that two or more conclusions are at least possible and merit consideration.

Symbolic-interactionist sociology offers perhaps the most compelling rationale for paying attention to breadth of perspective, although not a very clear statement of what the concept means or how it can best be measured.

As described by George Herbert Mead (1955), an infant (here labelled P) becomes a functioning human largely by:

1. Behaving.
2. Observing how others react to that behavior.
3. Imitating that behavior by others, incorporating it (and accompanying evaluations and assessments of P) into P's own cognitive and behavioral repertoire.
4. Thus gaining the tools to define himself or herself. Furthermore, because two or more others are normally taken into account, the maturing P learns that he or she can be defined and assessed in two or more ways. This realization, in turn, suggests that any one definition of P is arbitrary—not absolute and beyond question. Such definition permits P to see himself or herself as object—as something to be evaluated and altered or reinforced adaptively in light of probable outcomes.

As an aside, historian Daniel Boorstin (1971) said that there is danger of exaggeration and insincerity—and of widespread cynicism—when people construct pseudo-events designed to gain publicity and impress others. Maybe so. However, Erving Goffman (1959) argued persuasive...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• PART I RESEARCH REVIEWS
• PART II REPORTS OF ORIGINAL RESEARCH
• Author Index
• Subject Index