Interpretation frame

Interpretive frames are socially widespread and individually acquired knowledge structures on which processes of understanding are based. Frames of interpretation are especially important for the understanding of linguistic communication as they enrich what is said or written in the mostly imprecise everyday communication with contextual information that gives it its full meaning.

At the individual level, frames of interpretation are mental representations of the world. They shape our perception of the social environment and the meaning, meaningfulness and classification of social actions of other people, but also of reality as a whole, by assigning a meaningful structure to sensory impressions and experiences.

Viewed on a social level, frameworks of interpretation shape what certain communities treat as general “knowledge” in their linguistic usage, that is, as an experience-based and legitimate representation of a certain section of reality . Interpretive frames are products of habitualized social processes and thus subject to social dynamics. They are historically evolved and changeable elements of a culture ; conversely, thanks to their function that regulates perception and action, they are also an essential component and meaningful power of social developments.

Origin of the concept

The concept of gestalt perception , introduced into social psychology by Max Wertheimer in 1912 , can be regarded as an early forerunner of the interpretive framework concept. The English expression frames were in the social sciences of Gregory Bateson coined the "framing" ( framing saw) of communicative acts as an essential condition for the success of communication.

Sociologist Erving Goffman's work on frame analysis began to treat interpretive frames as an indispensable element of everyday social processes.

In linguistics , the concept of was Charles J. Fillmore introduced, which in its frame semantics an alternative to conventional "checklists" -Konzeptionen developed by word meanings - that is, the "true" meaning of a word that or its "legitimate" use Have a checklist of applicable properties of a lexical category identified by the word.

Wittgenstein, on the other hand, has demonstrated the importance of words as a far less logically based side effect of the familiar context of use in everyday language use.

In cognitive science and artificial intelligence research, Marvin Minsky's “ System of the Interpretive Framework ” became influential.

How interpretation frames work

Due to their fundamental and comprehensive importance for processes of perception and understanding, the functioning of interpretive frames can be described in several aspects.

Components and their function

According to Fillmore (1982), three components belong to a specific frame of interpretation :

• Spaces ( slots ),
• Filling elements ( fillers ) and
• Default values.

Spaces are all those elements that belong to a certain interpretive framework in a culture or community , e.g. B. in the interpretation frame "children's birthday" would be z. B. a birthday child, guests, gifts, a cake and typical activities. These elements are mutually all in a meaningful context, defined by the interpretation framework.

Filling elements would then be all possible birthday children, or examples of e.g. B. the blank “typical activities” (blowing out candles, games, etc.).

As a third type of element, default values ​​belong to a certain interpretation frame, which are filling elements (settings) for individual spaces that can be expected as prototypes.

The characteristic components (blanks / fillers) of interpretive frames include objects, people and actions as well as social / cultural values , role behavior , legitimate behavior and other normative aspects , which can make them a regulative appropriate behavior. Indeed, most, if not all of the social notions of appropriate behavior are bound by interpretive frameworks.

• Similarly, see also: Schema (Psychology)

Communication process

In communication, interpretive frames work in such a way that someone who begins to speak uses a typical way of speaking, coherent speech or other recognizable text elements to indicate what the utterances are going to lead to, and thus mobilize specific social knowledge. Listeners take up these contextualization hints in order to temporarily assign a suitable interpretive framework from their memory through which what is said can be understood, such as the modality as a pragmatic category .

Because the content dimensions belonging to a certain frame of interpretation are generally known, recipients can search for more or less implicit clues in what they hear for filling in the blanks, or, if such clues are missing, they can even add “default values” from their memory. In this way, the unspoken resonance becomes understandable, missing elements are added as a matter of course, and contradictions are disambiguated.

Framing effects

Issues can be framed in very different ways, so speakers can use specific interpretive frames for their presentation, each conveying a certain perception of these facts. When conveying offers of interpretation, framing primarily effects a selection and emphasis on certain aspects of reality and is thus an important means of strategic communication and rhetoric .

New frames can bring facts already described in a conversation or debate into a completely different context and thus cause perception to “tilt”, often only through a slight shift or relevance of other aspects, values ​​or ideas.

• See also: Tilting figure when changing the background of meaning in the sense of figure-ground perception .

Interpretive framework in political communication

In the investigation of political communication and media impact research , the concept of interpretive frames has become a key concept (Entman 1993, Scheufele 1999) to explain how political messages spread via the mass media influence the public understanding of political reality (Gamson 1992, Gotsbachner 2008) .

Politics is determined by a symbolic struggle for social meanings, through which the public perception of acute problems, the distribution of political roles, claims and target perspectives are shaped (Schön / Rein 1994).

Through the implementation and anchoring of specific interpretive frameworks, political actors try to gain influence on the different receptions of the electorate and thus subsequently determine what is “politically possible” in the medium term.

See also

• Frame semantics
• Framing (social sciences)

literature

• Entman, Robert M. (1993): Framing: Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm . Journal of Communication, 43, 51-58.
• Fillmore, Charles J. (1982): Frame Semantics . In: Linguistic Society of Korea (ed.): Linguistics in the Morning Calm. Selected Papers from SICOL 1981 . Seoul: Hanshin, 111-137
• Gamson, William A. (1992): Talking Politics . Cambridge: Cambridge UP.
• Goffman, Erving (1974): Frame Analysis . Cambridge: Harvard UP.
• Gotsbachner, Emo (2008): Implementation of interpretive frameworks in political television discussions. In: Conversation Research - Online Journal for Verbal Interaction. Edition 9/2008, pp. 269-299. ( Online text , PDF file; 204 kB)
• Gotsbachner, Emo (2009): Asserting Interpretative Frames of Political Events: Panel Discussions on Television News . In: Housley, William / Fitzgerald, Richard (eds.): Media, Policy and Interaction . London: Ashgate
• Minsky, Marvin (1975): A Framework for Representing Knowledge . In: Winston, Patrick Henry (ed.): The Psychology of Computer Vision . New York: Mc Graw-Hill
• Müller, Klaus (1984): Framework Analysis of Dialogue. Aspects of language understanding in everyday situations . Tübingen: Fool.
• Scheufele, Dietram A. (1999): Framing as a Theory of Media Effects . Journal of Communication, 49, 103-122.
• Schön, Donald A./Rein, Martin (1994): Frame Reflection. Toward the Resolution of Intractable Policy Controversies . New York: Basic Books.
• Wehling: Elisabeth (2016): Political Framing. How a nation persuades its thinking - and turns it into politics. Cologne, edition medienpraxis, Herbert von Halem Verlag.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Charles J. Fillmore: Frame Semantics. In: Linguistic Society of Korea (ed.): Linguistics in the Morning Calm. Selected Papers from SICOL 1981. Seoul: Hanshin, 111-137