CSA (Coherent Signal Alignment) Framework: A Foundational Interpretive Model of Coherence, Fragmentation, and Re-alignment in Complex Human Systems

This paper presents the foundational framework for Coherent Signal Alignment (CSA), a structured conceptual model for analysing coherence, fragmentation, and re-alignment in complex human systems. Although existing approaches examine cognitive, motivational, or structural variables, they often lack a cross-domain structural account of how misalignment across signalling environments constrains adaptive correction and sustains dysfunction. CSA addresses this gap by defining systemic dysfunction as a condition arising from degraded signal integrity and impaired feedback loops rather than from individual deficit or isolated causal factors. The framework formalises five interdependent constructs, coherence, fragmentation, signal integrity, feedback loops, re-alignment, and specifies their relational dynamics across cognitive, relational, institutional, and systemic domains. Within CSA, a signal is defined as any informational, behavioural, emotional, symbolic, environmental, or institutional input that shapes collective meaning formation and coordinated response. Signal integrity is evaluated in terms of clarity, proportionality, consistency, and contextual coupling. CSA operates at a meta-analytic level. It does not claim deterministic or probabilistic prediction, nor does it assert singular causal mechanisms. Instead, it constrains the space of plausible system trajectories by making alignment conditions and feedback limitations explicit, enabling structured anticipatory interpretation without predictive overreach. The framework defines explicit boundary conditions under which it would be challenged, including sustained coherence under prolonged signal distortion, re-alignment absent functional feedback correction, or fragmentation without competing interpretive signals. This document establishes the structural architecture for subsequent applied and operational CSA analyses.