The cognitive and the social structure of STS

Abstract

The differentiation of scientific fields into sub-fields can be studiedon the level of the 'scientific content' of the sub-field, thatis on the level of the products, as well as on the level of the 'socialstructures' of the sub-field, that is on the level of the producersof the content. By comparing the behavior of the constructs with the behaviorof the constructors, we are able to demonstrate the analytical distinctionbetween a cognitive and a social approach in an empirical way. This will beillustrated using the case of integration and differentiation in Science andTechnology Studies (STS). Elsewhere, using relations between documents, Ishowed how STS is characterized by strong differentiation tendencies. In thispaper I address the question to what extent this differentiation is also reflectedin the social structure of the STS field. Can STS scholars and STS researchgroups be classified in terms of the sub-fields? Or do researchers and institutescarry an integrative role in the STS field? Are the relations between thesub-fields of STS maintained by individual researchers or research institutes,and to what extent? The analysis in this paper reveals that this is generallynot the case. Although we are able to distinguish analytically between thecognitive and social dimension of the development of the research field, wefind similar patterns of differentiation on the social level too. At the sametime, this differentiation differs in some respects from the cognitive differentiationpattern. Consequently, the social and the cognitive dimensions of the STSfield are not independent – as no serious STS scholar would argue –but also not identical, as radical constructivists claim, but are stronglyinteracting. Further analysis may reveal the leading dynamics, that is answeringthe question whether the 'social' follows the 'cognitive',the other way around, or whether the dynamics has the pattern of 'co-evolution'.