This paper explores the issue of the regulation patterns of scientific activity through the analysis of the concept of 'scientific community'. It advocates that the regulation exerted by the scientific community on its activities can be described by three interpretations of the socialization process: normative, cognitive and transactional self-regulations. To develop this argument, after a brief introduction contextualizing the debate on the scientific community, we present Merton's interpretation of the scientific ethos and go through Kuhn's interpretation of paradigms before considering the exchange model proposed by Hagstrom. We then present some of our conclusions on the range and meaning of the concept of community to depict scientific activity through the comparison of these three author's contribution.
Scientific community; Integration; Merton; Kuhn; Hagstrom