| This study aims to shed light on the process of drawing boundaries between cultural groups. Specifically, the study looks at how professional organizations draw boundaries by disseminating messages via their own websites, events and journals, and via more public channels such as advertising and media relations. The underlying assumption is that health professions function in many respects as cultural groups and that instances of interprofessional communication are effectively moments of intercultural communication. As with many such moments, questions of power must be considered as a cultural group's economic, political and symbolic power can affect how messages are both sent and interpreted.;The research is focused on a nurse practitioners and pharmacists during a period of time (2008-2011) in which the legislation in Ontario governing the acts that members of these professions can perform was subjected to a broad consultation and revisions. This generated considerable communication activity by professional organizations. As such, the move to renew the Regulated Health Professions Act (Bill 179) provided an important opportunity to observe the communication activity of professional organizations, and to assess the manner in which these messages are engaged and interpreted.;The study used a blend of focus groups with members of the pharmacy and nurse practitioner professions, individual interviews with executives of professional organizations and with journalists, and a qualitative textual analysis of more than 200 texts drawn from professional journals and websites, and the news media.;The study found that messages -- by a professional's own organization and by other professions -- attract the attention of health professionals, especially when these celebrate a profession's identity or challenge a group's claim to professional identity. The findings also suggest that these messages can create shared understanding and shared identity, serving to reduce the perceived differences between groups, and lowering the level of anxiety members of each group feel as they collaborate. On the other hand, messages can interfere with shared understanding, stress difference over commonality, and heighten anxiety. The actual experience of collaborating with members of other professions was found, however, to have a greater impact on attitudes and working relations in the long term. |
