Editorial: Dialogues and interaction as “the nursery for change"

Abstract

This Special Issue deals with specific qualitative intervention and research frameworks, all grounded in Vygotskian cultural-historical psychology and activity theories (Leontiev, 1978; Vygotsky 1978). They are called “Developmental Methodologies”, as they share a critical focus on development in social and work practices. Research based on Developmental Methodologies may help both academic theory and social practice be more critical (and self-critical) and help them transform one another into reflected processes of development. These methodological frameworks share some specific features: (a) they build on mediation by signs and tools, (b) they aim to analyze and transform social practices, (c) they connect practitioners in the collective analysis and transformation of these social practices, (d) the research designs created are dialogical frameworks, based on a complex blend of collected data on everyday work activity and dialogues triggered by these data, (e) in these dialogical frameworks, analyzing everyday work activity is not a goal per se, but a way in which to trigger transformation, as experience is mediated and transformed into an object of inquiry, and (f) the researchers, besides supporting the interpretations of the practitioners, also try to support the development of these interpretations, thus leading to change and learning. One of these frameworks is the Finnish Developmental Work Research (DWR, Engestrom 1987), with its Change Lab methodology (Virkkunen & Newnham 2013) and associated Change Workshops (Seppanen & Koli 2010). The latter is an adaptation of the Change Lab methodology: it has shorter research times and focuses more on work-related wellbeing. Other interesting and important developmental frameworks are the French Activity Clinic approach, with its Cross Self-Confrontation (Clot, 1999, 2008, 2009) or Instructions to the Double (Oddone et al., 1981; Clot, 1999, 2001) methodologies, and the American 5th Dimension (Cole & Engestrom 2007) methodology. In the last ten years, a scientific dialogue regarding these frameworks has developed at international conferences (see for example ISCAR 2008, 2011; Sannino, 2011) . This Special Issue aims to deepen this