Noticing.

Witkin, Stanley L.

The range of what we think and do is limited by what we fail to notice. And because we fail to notice that we fail to notice, there is little we can do to change; until we notice how failing to notice shapes our thoughts and deeds.

Ronald Laing

We commonly assist our clients or others with whom we work in noticing things about themselves or their environments that they seem unable to perceive: We show couples how each contributes to their relationship discord, we point out to parents their child's attempts to please them, and we confront policy-makers with stories of hardship to help them notice how people are affected by their policies. Showing, pointing out, and confronting are but part of an impressive armamentarium of strategies we use to help others notice what they fail to notice and what we think they should notice.

Our different standpoints, interests, and beliefs enable us to notice others' not noticing and how it "shapes [their] thoughts and deeds." For the same reasons, others may notice what we do not, particularly clients whose life experiences, social positions, interests, and language differ from our own. If Laing is correct, our openness to what clients notice about our not noticing can be important. However, the "rules" of client-social worker encounters may make it difficult for them to tell us what we are not noticing or, when they do tell us, for us to hear them. Instead of an opportunity for greater insight, we may interpret their observations as expressions of the difficulties that occasion the particular interchange. For clients, our failure to notice can have important consequences, as when, for example, we fail to notice the ways in which they differ from their diagnostic categories, their efforts to achieve their goals, or how years of abuse have undermined their sense of self-efficacy.

Despite our differences, we also share with clients assumptions and beliefs that blind us all from noticing how we fail to notice. Widespread cultural beliefs and practices about individualism, the psychological nature of life, and language may lead client and social worker not to notice how social and political forces influence how we identify and attempt to ameliorate problems or how things categorized in the same way are different. This last issue was a concern of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. He was concerned with how taken-for-granted or well-established ways of using language keep us from noticing "things before our eyes," in particular, that things called by the same name have a common essence. Wittgenstein (1958) encouraged us to see how words actually were used and applied in different situations. Consider, for example, words referring to ethnicity, diagnosis, and disability and how their use sometimes keeps us from noticing the complexities and differences among people identified with these labels.

These challenges are compounded by those who wish to keep us from noticing certain things. In such cases we have to overcome deliberate efforts to hide, obscure, or make things less salient. For example, the government may not want us to notice how many children go hungry each day, the size and composition of our prison inmate population, or the different standards we use for different nations when addressing their treatment of human rights. Pharmaceutical companies may not want us to notice their influence on medical research and the drugs physicians prescribe. Multinational corporations may not want us to notice their use of child labor. Developers put up a veneer of trees to keep us from noticing the trees that have been lost to cement and asphalt. Various strategies, such as making access to certain information difficult, discounting information, and directing our attention to other incompatible ideas, are used to influence our noticing. An example of the latter strategy is the recent advertisements by s ome tobacco companies portraying themselves as socially responsible and caring businesses.

The ability to manipulate noticing, differences among what people notice, and the influence of language point to noticing as subject to the sway of social processes rather than as a function of observing what is already "out there." This understanding suggests new possibilities for enhancing our capacity to "notice how failing to notice shapes our thoughts and deeds."

What Is There to Notice?

For something to be noticed, it must be perceivable. It must be located within detectable parameters, materially--for example, the spectrum of visible light--and, perhaps less obvious, conceptually, within the range of intelligibility as defined by a culture. Some examples may help clarify the latter. If I claim to notice a 10-foot-long dancing jelly bean in my living room, it is doubtful that others will agree. Rather, my claim likely would be seen as symptomatic of a potentially serious problem. Or if I tell my clients that I notice their nose grows a bit longer whenever they do not tell the truth, my "observation" would be challenged vigorously. Now in case you are thinking these examples are merely empirical claims that cannot be substantiated, consider that there are many similar such claims, ranging from religious images to UFOs to quarks, that we readily accept.

These examples are meant to illustrate that what can be noticed is bounded by what makes sense in our culture. Expressions of noticing that are unintelligible are considered misperceptions such as illusions, or symptoms of physical or psychological problems, or drug use. But because intelligibility is a social construct, it will change over time and place, thereby altering the range of what can be noticed.

How Do I Know What I Have Noticed?

Noticing involves extracting something from a context (although the extracting process too is contextual). I cannot notice the clouds until I see them as separate from the sky. The context from which I extract what I notice helps me to name it. Leiter (cited in Weick, 1995) suggests that "without a supplied context, objects and events have equivocal or multiple meanings" (p. 52). Let's consider some examples:

* I notice an object moving through the sky. The object is silver in color, appears relatively long and narrow, has flat objects protruding horizontally about halfway down each side, and makes a kind of whirring noise. As in the clouds example, I first must know that the object is not part of the sky. Second, within the context of information I have about objects with these characteristics, I decide that what I am noticing is an airplane. Now assume this same object appears in the sky over a person from an isolated culture, who has had no contact with the modern technology. What does this person notice? Certainly not an airplane, possibly a spirit or a god, assuming that a spiritual context provides the best way to make the object intelligible.

* I am walking down the street when I notice a man and woman speaking in loud voices to each other. The man is saying, "I cannot tolerate such behavior," while lifting his arm above his head. What am I noticing? Once again, Leiter's comments are germane: "...people routinely do not state the intended meaning of the expressions they use. The expressions are vague and equivocal, lending themselves to several meanings. The sense or meaning of these expressions cannot be decided unless a context is supplied. That context consists of such particulars as who the speaker is (his biography), the relevant aspects of his biography, his current purpose and intent, the setting in which the remarks are made or the actual, or potential relationship between the speaker and hearer" (p. 107). Just when I assume that I am observing an argument that is close to getting out of hand, I notice a sign nearby announcing a performance of "street theater." Immediately, what I am noticing changes from an argument to a dramatic performance.

* In 1973 David Rosenhan published a now-famous study describing the experiences of eight people who got themselves admitted to psychiatric hospitals after fabricating symptoms. Once admitted, all eight dropped their initial complaint and interacted with staff in a genuine manner. Despite this, the hospital staff continued to "notice" symptomatic behavior in the pseudo-patients, behavior which in another context would be seen as quite reasonable and ordinary. My earlier example of noticing nose growth whenever a person lied becomes perfectly intelligible within the context of the story of Pinnochia.

* Sensitivity to the context dependence of noticing enables us to notice the absence of something. This excerpt from a Sherlock Holmes story (cited in Goldstein & Goldstein, 1978) illustrates such acuity:

Colonel Ross: "Is there any point to which you wish to draw my attention?"

Holmes: "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."

Colonel Ross: "The dog did nothing in the night-time."

Holmes: "That was the curious incident."

That the dog "did nothing" suggested to Holmes that the crime was committed by someone with whom the dog was familiar. In this context, noticing "nothing" was noticing "something."

I hope by now my point is clear: Noticing involves an intertwined, interdependent relationship between what is noticed and various contexts. Intelligibility depends on the contexts assumed, their compatibility with culturally recognized explanations, and understandings of what is possible within those contexts.

Language

The social aspect of noticing is highlighted further by the role of language. Expressions of noticing that enter the stream of social discourse are legitimated, dismissed, or revised. If the geographically isolated person in my earlier example told her companions that she saw an "airplane," it would have no meaning, at least as we understand the word. Instead, she might be told that what she "actually" noticed was the spirit of a deceased ancestor. We might imagine this interpretation being supported by various cultural myths predicting such events or its contiguity with other events having significance within cultural lore. In other words, within the context of this culture, noticing a spirit makes more sense and is more compellingly supported than noticing an airplane.

One implication of this perspective is that what we notice may not be clear until after we speak about it. We need others to help us make sense out of what we thought we saw. Thus, rather than being an individual activity, noticing is relational. This relational dimension seems particularly important for "noticings" that are ambiguous or disturbing: Did I really notice needle marks on the person's arm? Was what I observed inappropriate treatment of a client by a colleague? Am I noticing abuse when I observe that my neighbor's wife rarely goes out and wears dark glasses even when it is cloudy?

Saying what we notice creates it (for example, see Weick, 1995). This can be risky. Others attend to our words and may react in ways that are harmful. Whether we express what we noticed depends on the intended audience of the expression, their relationship with the speakers, and the assessment of risk involved. Such situations are highly relevant to social work. For example, consider the client who notices that her worker always writes something whenever she makes a negative comment about her spouse or the adolescent client who notices sexual feelings for a classmate and wants to know whether he is gay. Can they safely express what they noticed (and what the worker may not)? If we want to know what our clients notice and what we fail to notice, we need to create relational spaces where divergent noticings can be safely expressed.

Further Implications

I have argued that what we notice is a social act. My interest in this topic is more than academic. What we notice has consequences. In organizations, for example, Weick (1995) commented that what we notice "are seeds from which people develop a larger sense of what may be occurring:" "points of reference" that "direct people's attention" (p. 50). The consequences of noticing are particularly relevant in relationships of unequal power in which certain people have greater authority to name what they and others notice. This inequality may be addressed in part by shifting from a position of veracity--what was really noticed--to one of use: How does what we notice help or hinder the pursuit of our goals; in what contexts do particular kinds of noticing occur?

Noticing reflects a standpoint. Enabling, legitimating, and hearing multiple standpoints increases the possibilities of what could be noticed and a richer understanding of our own noticings. Also, because social workers are concerned with what is not noticed (see Witkin, 1998), the noticings of marginalized people should be of particular interest to them. To this end, we can strive to become more aware of the limits of our noticing, identify what keeps us from noticing, and strive to expand what we can notice.

I am reminded of Holbrook's (1995) study comparing public agency workers' descriptions of a female client, as documented in their case records, with that of her own written narrative. Where the workers noticed a disorganized and unkempt home, the client noticed what she needed to do to get several children ready for school each morning. This example suggests that we need not only to create space for other voices and perspectives but that we need to find ways to shift our own standpoint so that we may notice differently. Such shifts can be brought about in various ways, ranging from empathy to physically entering the situation of the other.

Finally, we may want to examine how our theoretical orientations influence what we notice and our openness to learning what we do not. Some examples: Is my noticing privileged by my theory? How much variation in what is noticed is permitted or must there always a right interpretation? How are context and language considered? Must clients adopt my context for me to legitimate their noticing? Such questions may help sensitize us to the limits of our own noticing and increase our ability to recognize what others may notice, leading to more informed, connected practices.

References

Goldstein, M., & Goldstein, I. F. (1978). How we know. New York: Plenum Press.

Holbrook, T. L. (1995). Finding subjugated knowledge: Personal document research. Social Work, 40, 746-751.

Rosenhan, D. (1973). On being sane in insane places. Science, 179, 250-258.

Weick, K. E. (1995). Sensemaking in organizations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Witkin, S. L. (1998). Chronicity and invisibility [Editorial]. Social Work, 43, 294-295.

Wittgenstein, L. (1958). Philosophical investigations (3rd ed.) (G.E.M. Anscombe, Trans.), G.E.M. Anscombe & R. Rhees (Eds.). New York: Macmillan.