Operationalizing Personalized Medicine: Data Translation Practices in Bioinformatics Laboratories

This paper presents findings from an ethnographic study of two genomics and bioinformatics labs. The focus of this research is on the day-to-day practices of using multiple technologies to integrate data across different platforms. We argue that sociotechnical challenges (including technical, contextual, and political challenges) emerge when data integration practices are carried out, due to the embedded nature of the important, yet unrecorded and implicit historical information that each dataset carries. We observed that sociotechnical sensemaking was common place in lab work, and was the only method for working out the complexity of the challenges which arose during data integration activities. We suggest that due attention be given to this matter, as challenges related to assessing data are likely to arise once more when such data travels back to the bedside, where it is poised to directly impact human health

Design Ltd.: Renovated Myths for the Development of Socially Embedded Technologies

This paper argues that traditional and mainstream mythologies, which have been continually told within the Information Technology domain among designers and advocators of conceptual modelling since the 1960s in different fields of computing sciences, could now be renovated or substituted in the mould of more recent discourses about performativity, complexity and end-user creativity that have been constructed across different fields in the meanwhile. In the paper, it is submitted that these discourses could motivate IT professionals in undertaking alternative approaches toward the co-construction of socio-technical systems, i.e., social settings where humans cooperate to reach common goals by means of mediating computational tools. The authors advocate further discussion about and consolidation of some concepts in design research, design practice and more generally Information Technology (IT) development, like those of: task-artifact entanglement, universatility (sic) of End-User Development (EUD) environments, bricolant/bricoleur end-user, logic of bricolage, maieuta-designers (sic), and laissez-faire method to socio-technical construction. Points backing these and similar concepts are made to promote further discussion on the need to rethink the main assumptions underlying IT design and development some fifty years later the coming of age of software and modern IT in the organizational domain.Comment: This is the peer-unreviewed of a manuscript that is to appear in D. Randall, K. Schmidt, & V. Wulf (Eds.), Designing Socially Embedded Technologies: A European Challenge (2013, forthcoming) with the title "Building Socially Embedded Technologies: Implications on Design" within an EUSSET editorial initiative (www.eusset.eu/

Taking IT Artifacts Seriously: Developing a Mixed Determinants Model of Assimilation of Telehealth Systems

A number of healthcare authorities are considering the adoption of telehealth into mainstream clinical care, bringing telehealth technology out of experimental settings into real life settings. To fully reap the benefits from a technological innovation, the innovation must be assimilated into the organization\u27s work system. As most literature on telehealth adoption to date has focused on its evaluation (e.g., user acceptance), more work is warranted to understand how telehealth can be integrated into administrative and clinical practices and to identify factors that may impinge onto telehealth integration. Borrowing from institutional, structuration and organizational learning theories, we propose a research framework* to address limitations of past work and to guide research and managerial actions while integrating telehealth in the workplace

Organizing Practice and Practicing Organization: An Outline of Translational Mobilization Theory

Understanding the relationship between emergent social phenomena and the stabilizing mechanisms that make collective action possible is a long-standing concern in social science, but remains an inadequately theorized area. This article sets out a middle range theory—translational mobilization theory—to address this challenge. Adopting a practice-based approach, we connect interactionist perspectives on social order, analyses of sociotechnical networks, and theories of strategic action fields, to describe and explain how projects of institutionally sanctioned collective action are progressed by actors interacting with and through socially constructed objects. Investigating these mechanisms is a prerequisite to advancing empirical and theoretical understanding of the complex organizational processes and structures that characterize contemporary society

Organizing solidarity initiatives : a socio-spatial conceptualization of resistance

This paper offers a spatial conceptualization of resistance by focusing on the practices through which solidarity initiatives constitute new resistance socio-spatialities. We discuss two solidarity initiatives in Greece, WCNA and Vio.Me.SI, and explore how they institute distinctive local and translocal organizational practices that make the production of new forms of resistance possible. In particular, we adopt a productive and transformative view of resistance. First, we identify three local practices of organizing solidarity initiatives, namely, the organization of general assembly meetings, the constitution of resistance laboratories and the (re)articulation of socio-spatial relations in local sites. Then, we turn to flows, movements and translocal social formations, and examine the role of solidarity mobilizations, the material and symbolic co-production of resources and members’ mobility in the production of resistance. We conclude that new resistance socio-spatialities become constitutive of a broader reconfiguration of political agencies, a creative process that challenges existing relations and invites alternative ways of working and organizing

From boundary object to boundary subject; the role of the patient in coordination across complex systems of care during hospital discharge

From boundary object to boundary subject; the role of 1 the patient in coordination across complex systems of 2 care during hospital discharge 3 4 Abstract 5 Advocates for patient involvement argue that seeking the active contribution of 6 patients and families in the coordination of care can help mitigate system 7 complexity, and lead to improvements in quality. However, sociological and 8 organisational research has identified barriers to involving patients in care 9 planning, not least the power of, and boundaries between, multiple professional 10 groups. This study draws on literature from Science and Technology Studies (STS) 11 to explore the patients' role in coordinating care across professional-practice 12 boundaries in complex care systems. Findings are drawn from a two-year 13 ethnographic study (including 69 qualitative interviews) of hospital discharge 14 following hip-fracture care, and describe the changing role of the patient as they 15 move out of hospital into community settings. Findings describe how 'the patient' 16 plays a relatively passive role as boundary object while recovering from surgery 17 within hospital, where inter-professional coordination was prescribed by 18 evidence-based guidelines, leaving little space for patient voice. As discharge 19 planning begins, patient involvement is both encouraged and contested by 20 different professional groups, with varying commitment to include patient 21 subjectivities in care. As patients move into home and community settings, they, 2

Networks for Economic Sociology (and Not the Other Way Around)

Note from the editor Networks for economic sociology (not the other way around) by Olivier Godechot Is social network analysis useful for studying the family economy? by Céline Bessière and Sibylle Gollac Networks of Corporate Ancestry by Lasse Folke Henriksen et al. Embeddedness and decoupling in innovation activities by Michel Grossetti A tale of two cities: the regional dimension of the Ecuadorian securities market by Andrés Chiriboga-Tejada Neo-structural economic sociology beyond embeddedness by ORIO Network Book Review

Race, Class, and College Access: Achieving Diversity in a Shifting Legal Landscape

This is a groundbreaking report examining how legal challenges to race-conscious admissions are influencing contemporary admissions practices at selective colleges and universities around the country. The report is especially timely in light of the U.S. Supreme Court decision to take a second look at the constitutionality of the University of Texas' admissions policy by granting review in Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin.Study findings are based on responses to a first-of-its-kind national survey of undergraduate admissions and enrollment management leaders administered in 2014 -- 15. Data reflect responses from 338 nonprofit four-year institutions that collectively enrolled 2.7 million students and fielded over 3 million applications for admission in 2013 -- 14. Among other findings, the authors examine the most widely used and effective diversity strategies; changes in admissions factors after the 2013 Fisher ruling and statewide bans on race-conscious admissions; and the most sought after research and guidance given the current legal and policy landscap