Four Major Social Scientific Theories and Their Value to the Public Relations Researcher

The process of building a body of theoretically and empirically based knowledge about public relations need not take place in a vacuum. This chapter explores four major sociological perspectives that constitute the frameworks for much of contemporary organizational theory and research. Working from the premise that public relations is an inherently organizational form of communication, the author explores some assumptions and propositions which the symbolic interactionist, exchange, conflict, and structural—functional theories suggest, both for enriching existing theory and building new public relations theory.