Understanding how communication works in society is a crucial part of social psychology; this groundbreaking work by Ruesch and Bateson explains themes vital to understanding the subject.

Each chapter discusses a new facet of communication; the contexts of promoting harmony and cultural mores between humans, how faults in communication act to announce mental illness, how beliefs and comprehension are solidified. The recurring theme - that communication is a complex interplay of factors, a matrix by which the psychologist can know society - leads on to theoretical discussions of cybernetics: how humans, and the regulated systems and structures they have created, may be understood.

Where later studies of communication focus solely on messages and their behavioral ramifications, Ruesch and Bateson's 1951 study delved farther; into the very edifices of modern society. Though their methodology fell out of favor in communicology, this text stands as a proponent of concepts that remain both interesting and relevant. Philosophical concepts of cause-and-effect, of feedback between elements of a communicative system, are posited as crucial to understanding intricacies of modern life. For readers seeking a fresh, embracing introduction to the study of communication, this work brings both essential knowledge and a fascinating history of the discipline.