I’m having a hard time making time for additional writing these days, so I’m posting more of my philosophical musings.
I am interested in observing how people come to agreement on a subject of co-focusing. Social Darwinism is assumed here, such that social behavior is motivated by the need to solve problems collaboratively in order to reduce uncertainty. As I’ve previously discussed, co-focusing is achieved through communicating and is greater than the sum of the individuals’ focus; the individuals must not only perceive and attend to the same object, but must also perceive and attend to the others who are also attending to the same object. In Hak Soo Kim’s definition of co-focusing, this is how the actors create a collective commitment, where the object of their focus is a problem that they must collaborate to solve. The actors must communicate to affirm that they are attending to the same object, exchanging comment around the topic of their object of attending, until they reach a level of agreement that is satisfactory for their goals. As communicating never yields perfect and unanimous comprehension of the meaning that is constructed, achieving co-focusing requires sufficient agreement as opposed to absolute agreement.
In general, I assume that actors only engage in communicating as long as it has continued utility for them, although they are not necessarily aware of or methodical and calculating in the assessment of the utility of communicating. By extension, the actors will only continue communicating about the focus of attending as long as there is additional perceived utility for achieving the goal of co-focusing. This assumption leaves room for variation in interpretation among individuals as to the actual object of co-focusing, mediated by the group’s perceived need for level of agreement. I believe that the level of agreement that is required to identify or bound the object of co-focusing is related to the level of perceived risk associated with mis- or under-identification.
It is important to note that this relationship is specifically based on the perception of risk as well as individual and group risk aversion; the collective perception of risk and level of group risk aversion are also developed as a part of co-focusing. In situations where the perceived risks associated with misidentifying the object of co-focusing are high and risk aversion is also high, the collective actors will be more specific and explicit in eliciting agreement about the object. The activity of refining the problem space requires co-cognizing to define the problem and its associated risks, yet the aggregate behavior remains within the definition of co-focusing.
I assume that there is a point at which the collective actors move on from communicating about “what is the problem?” (co-focusing) to “what can we do about the problem?” (co-cognizing) but it also seems that co-focusing and co-cognizing could be iteratively engaged until the point at which co-cognizing can generate a solution amenable to co-moving or collective action. For example, a group co-focuses to determine “the problem is homelessness” but in co-cognizing about what can be done, the group quickly realizes that they cannot solve the entire problem of homelessness, and returns to co-focusing to determine that “the problem is homelessness in our community.” I suspect that in problem-solving situations characterized by high risk aversion, the level of agreement required for co-focusing will be high, and will be more readily observable.
I also assume that co-focusing is a primary activity that denotes group formation. Until two or more individuals co-focus to determine the basic relationship that defines them as a group, whether it is a specific problem focus or just a natural desire for social contact with others of similar interests and pursuits, group membership is not defined. I assume that group membership can be defined by active participation in co-focusing, because this activity is primarily concerned with identifying an object (problem) for which continued interaction among individuals generates continued utility. The actors who participate in co-focusing are group members so long as they continue to participate in group activities; based on this assumption, I expect that individuals whose focus diverges from the group’s co-focus will tend to become less active in the collective communicating, or will cease to attempt to co-focus and become inactive with respect to the group. I realize that there is extensive literature on the topics of identity and group membership which would be useful to consider, but for the moment, I am taking group membership to be defined by and observable through communicating.
So the question I arrive at is, “How can I observe co-focusing?” The necessity of communicating to achieving co-focusing means that communicating behaviors will be the focus of observation. My goal is then to identify those communicating behaviors that demonstrate co-focusing; however, this is going to be complicated by contextual factors.
In some contexts, digital archives of electronic communications would provide observable artifacts of behavior that can be analyzed to identify episodes of co-focusing. In other contexts, direct observation of the communicating behaviors of a group of individuals who are co-focusing on a problem would be desired, but this is inherently challenging. Unless it is a case of high risk aversion with a protracted co-focusing effort to define a problem, it is hard to observe the formation of a group because of the difficulty in predicting when groups will form and from which individuals. There are specific contexts where group formation is predictable, so these could provide an opportunity to observe co-focusing in group formation as it occurs; examples might include student cohorts, task-oriented teams where membership is assigned, and some situations of organizational change. These are very complex situations to observe because communicating behaviors that contribute to co-focusing may be more or less explicit depending on the context. In addition, an experimental situation can be created in order to generate an observable episode of co-focusing in group formation as it occurs.
In most cases, however, it seems that group formation is examined after the fact. In cases where the activities took place in an environment that facilitates recording the communications, such as an email listserv or other digital medium, the records can be analyzed and group members can also be interviewed. In cases where there is no literal record of the group’s co-focusing, interviewing and focus groups could provide methods of eliciting the key features of their co-focusing experience.