Design of Environments & Technology For Distributed Collaboration
This thread centers on understanding how distributed collaboration is mediated by technical and informational artifacts, focusing on design as product (as distinct from the process perspective in thread 1). A major problem of work-processes that span knowledge-boundaries is the lack of a common language for collaboration, or a good understanding of how knowledge-sharing is mediated by the informational artifacts and environments presented by IT systems. It draws on the theories of distributed cognition and contextual emergence discussed above, relating these to contextual design, situated design emergence, adaptation, and “thrownness” (Markus et al., 2002; Suchman, 1998; Weick, 2004) , and to epistemic theories that conceptualize technology as embedding social and political interests (Knorr Cetina, 1999; Latour, 1987). This thread of my work explores the forms of knowledge shared across organizational boundaries, the mechanisms for sharing knowledge that are employed, and how information, learning, and knowledge technology environments and artifacts may be designed to support these mechanisms.
Selected Papers
Gasson, S. and Elrod, E.M. (2006) ‘Distributed Knowledge Coordination Across Virtual Organization Boundaries’, in Proceedings of ICIS ’06, Milwaukee, WI, paper KM-01. [Best paper in track award] .
Waters, J. and Gasson, S. (2006) ‘Social Engagement In An Online Community Of Inquiry, ‘ in Proceedings of ICIS ’06, Milwaukee, WI, paper HCI-03. [Full research paper].
DeLuca, D., Gasson, S., and Kock, N. (2006) 'Adaptations That Virtual Teams Make So That Complex Tasks Can Be Performed Using Simple e-Collaboration Technologies', International J. of e-Collaboration,2 (3), pp. 65-91
Gasson, S. (2005) ‘Boundary-Spanning Knowledge-Sharing In E-Collaboration’, Proceedings of Hawaii Intl. Conf. on System Sciences (HICSS-38), Jan. 2005. http://doi.ieeecomputersociety.org/10.1109/HICSS.2005.123
Findings & current projects
Current studies are funded by my NSF Career award until Feb. 2009. My findings have traced how distributed organizational groups adapt and enlist various forms of technology to negotiate their organizational roles, the various forms of technology-supported “group memory” that operate when groups are faced with novel organizational problems, and how asynchronous learning environments may be designed to support deep student engagement and peer-learning. Two field studies are ongoing: in electronic patient record systems, and in the design of online learning environments.
I have a research proposal: The Impact of Rich Media Technologies on Teaching and Learning Strategies in Higher Education , in preparation. Initial studies are investigating the fit of course delivery with student expectations and learning strategies. Further studies will analyze the effect of ubiquitous (location-free) information and rich media technologies on course-design and pedagogy, to suggest a framework for the use of portable learning technologies in Undergraduate education.
References
Knorr Cetina, K.D. Epistemic Cultures: How the Sciences Make Knowledge, Harvard Univ. Press, Cambridge, MA, 1999.
Latour, B. Science in Action, Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, 1987.
Markus, M.L. and Bjorn-Andersen, N. "Power over users: its exercise by system professionals," Communications of the ACM June 1987 (30:6) 1987, pp 498-504.
Suchman, L. "Constituting shared workspaces," in: Cognition and Communication at Work, Y. Engestrom and D. Middleton (eds.), Cambridge University Press, New York, 1998, p. 350.
Weick, K.E. "Designing For Throwness," in: Managing as Designing, R. Boland, J and F. Collopy (eds.), Stanford Uniersity Press, Stanford CA, 2004, pp. 74-78.
