Abstract
Social representation theory, as proposed by Moscovici in 1960's, should be regarded as a meta-theory for social psychological studies. It emphasizes social constructionism instead of a subject-object paradigm for its epistemological bases. In the present study, Wagner's view of social representation is discussed, proposing the following three modifications. First, it is proposed that social representation is not merely a cognitive entity located inside the mind, representing an object, but the seemingly represented object itself. Second, this understanding of social representation is rejected to introduce a second, a more accurate view arguing that social representation is a process through which an object, belonging to a world of“something” (a world that can be defined only by the presence of indefinable“something”), is socially constructed. Finally, the second definition of social representation was replaced by the final one that social representation is a process through which the world of“something”, where both objective and subjective moments are mixed up unseparatedly, is differentiated and elaborated into a subject and an object.
