Abstract

GOMEZ-DIAGO, Gloria. Typologies of paradigms in communication research. A classification proposal. Revista de Comunicación [online]. 2022, vol.21, n.1, pp.181-194.  Epub Apr 14, 2022. ISSN 1684-0933.  http://dx.doi.org/10.26441/rc21.1-2022-a9.

Paradigms, understood as perspectives, are decisive in shaping scientific activity. In this sense, one of the main reasons for the lack of intellectual institutionalization of the field of communication (Peters, 2007; Lacasa, 2017) may be the absence of disciplinary memory (Pooley, 2020) and of discussion of research perspectives. It is necessary to contribute to fill the epistemological vacuum of a field that is emerging as very relevant in the coming decades, being needed from a communicative perspective intended to generate more democratic environments. In a line of inquiry located within the confluence of meta-research and history of communication research, which we name meta-research of ideas (Gómez-Diago, 2020, 2021.a, 2021.b), through a review of reference works published in the last five decades which address the role of paradigms in communication research, several typologies of paradigms were identified, and grouped in three categories referring to what they put attention on: 1) Ways of obtaining knowledge, 2) Ways of studying media and 3) Ways of understanding communication. It is from this last typological perspective focused on the different meanings that can be attributed to communication from which it seems feasible (re) building an epistemology for the field of communication that (re) updates the conception of communication, accounting for a society in transformation, while contributing to improve its conditions.

Keywords : Epistemology; history of communication research; meta-research; methodology; communication theory; communication theories; paradigms.

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