Some of the characteristics of the symbolic interaction perspective are an emphasis on interactions among people, use of symbols in communication and interaction, interpretation as part of action, self as constructed by individuals and others in flexible, adjustable social processes through communication and …

You can learn all the theories and understand the concept down to the core. There is a huge difference between theory vs. practice. Theory assumes an outcome, while practice allows you to test the theory and see if it is accurate.

Symbolic interactionism is viewing society as composed of symbols that people use to establish meaning, develop views about the world, and communicate with one another. We are thinking beings who act according to how we interpret situations.

Blumer, who did much to shape this perspective, specified its three basic premises: (1) Humans act toward things on the basis of the meanings that things have for them; (2) the meanings of things derive from social interaction; and (3) these meanings are dependent on, and modified by, an interpretive process of the …

Three paradigms have come to dominate sociological thinking, because they provide useful explanations: structural functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionism.

Three theoretical perspectives guide sociological thinking on social problems: functionalist theory, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionist theory. These perspectives look at the same social problems, but they do so in different ways.

Symbolic thinking is what allows humans to talk about past events, as well as to hypothesize about what may happen in the future. In other words, it allows you to get out of a current situation in order to evoke another reality, be it past or future.

This distinction was originally based on the idea that the former (“Me”) corresponds to the self as an object of experience (self as object), while the latter (“I”) reflects the self as a subject of experience (self as subject).

Self is not evident at birth but emerges over time through language, play, and games. The self consists of ‘me’ and ‘I’. The ‘me’ represents learned societal behaviors and expectations, and the ‘I’ represents the individual’s identity based on the response to those social behaviors and expectations.

To understand this topic, he developed a theory of moral development that includes three levels: preconventional, conventional, and postconventional.