Resumen

SAENZ DIAZ, Diana Karent; MALDONADO GONZALEZ, Ana Lucía  y  FIGUEROA DE KATRA, Lyle. Structure and organization of the social representation on consumerism. A case study of Colonia 18 de marzo in Minatitlán, Veracruz. Cultura representaciones soc [online]. 2016, vol.11, n.21, pp.211-241. ISSN 2007-8110.

The environmental problem that we are facing today is presented as a social, cultural, political and economic crisis of planetary dimensions, caused by human activity. Our relationship with the environment is perceived as an instrumental relationship whose main principle is the exploitation of natural resources in the name of human development and well-being. One of the social practices that contribute to environmental degradation is consumerism; this activity is conceived as the acquisition and use of goods and services. The development of marketing and the system of production have produced a consumerist culture by generating desires and expectations in the consumer, causing a significant impact on the extraction and processing of natural resources. The origin of this text is a research carried out in order to analyze the social representations on consumerism of the inhabitants of colonia 18 de marzo in the municipality of Minatitlán. The theoretical and methodological approach of social representations is useful to explore the subjective reality of social actors and reveals the system of reference that guides the subject to action. Here, it is approached from Abric’s perspective (2001) which emphasizes its structural feature, based on the content and organization of representations. As far as consumerism is concerned, the sustainability approach is assumed. Associative and interrogative methods were applied to a sample of 20 participants. The main findings of the techniques used in the associative method are presented, that is, the core and peripheral elements that the population under study shares on consumerism.

Palabras llave : social representations; consumerism; structural approach; environmental education.

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