Losing Touch:An embodiment perspective on coordination in robotic surgery

Because new technologies allow new performances, mediations, representations, and information flows, they are often associated with changes in how coordination is achieved. Current coordination research emphasizes its situated and emergent nature, but seldom accounts for the role of embodied action. Building on a 25-month field study of the da Vinci robot, an endoscopic system for minimally invasive surgery, we bring to the fore the role of the body in how coordination was reconfigured in response to a change in technological mediation. Using the robot, surgeons experienced both an augmentation and a reduction of what they can do with their bodies in terms of haptic, visual, and auditory perception and manipulative dexterity. These bodily augmentations and reductions affected joint task performance and led to coordinative adaptations (e.g., spatial relocating, redistributing tasks, accommodating novel perceptual dependencies, and mounting novel responses) that, over time, resulted in reconfiguration of roles, including expanded occupational knowledge, emergence of new specializations, and shifts in status and boundaries. By emphasizing the importance of the body in coordination, this paper suggests that an embodiment perspective is important for explaining how and why coordination evolves following the introduction of a new technology

Predictive policing ontcijferd:Een etnografie van het 'Criminaliteits Anticipatie Systeem' in de praktijk

Dit artikel beschrijft een etnografische studie naar het gebruik van statistische voorspellingen voor politiewerk (i.e., ‘predictive policing’). In dit onderzoek ‘ontcijferen’ wij zowel de input als de output van deze voorspellingen door in te gaan op hoe het gebruik van deze technologie in de praktijk tot stand komt. Dit begint bij de data scientist, die met het ontwerp van het algoritme de input en output beïnvloedt, en eindigt bij agenten op straat, die de voorspellingen wel of niet serieus nemen. Ons onderzoek gaat in tegen de algemene aanname dat een predictive policing algoritme als objectief en onafhankelijk instrument kan worden ingezet voor het verhogen van efficiëntie en effectiviteit. In plaats daarvan stellen wij dat het soms maanden werk vraagt en afhankelijk is van de handelingen en contextuele kennis van verschillende actoren (bijvoorbeeld, politieagenten, intelligence specialisten, politiemanagement, gemeente) die daarbij hun inzet en oordelen met de technologie verweven

The impact of secondary mineral formation on Na-K-geothermometer readings: a case study for the Valley of Geysers hydrothermal system (Kronotsky State Nature Biosphere Reserve, Kamchatka)

The temperature in the Valley of Geysers (Kamchatka) geothermal reservoir calculated using the feldspar Na-K-geothermometer has been steadily increasing over the past 10 years on average from 165 to 235 °C, which is close to the temperature values of a hydrothermal explosion of the steam and water mixture. For the analysis of chemical geothermometers, TOUGHREACT-simulation was used, with the help of which the previously known Na-K feldspar geothermometer was reproduced on a single-element model and new formulas were obtained for three Na-K geothermometers: zeolite, smectite, and based on volcanic glass. Data of chemical analysis for the period 1968-2018, in which the chloride ion is considered as an inert tracer of geofiltration processes, indicates that after 2007 a significant inflow of infiltration water (its mass fraction is estimated from 5 to 15 %) into the Geyser reservoir. It is assumed that the Na-K increased values of the feldspar geothermometer are not the result of the temperature increase in the Geyser reservoir, but the effect of smectite water dilution

Why developers matter: The case of patient portals

Abstract Existing studies on patient data portals are informative with respect to the patient and physician perspectives, yet relatively little attention has been paid to the role of developers. This case study focuses on how developers view the meaning and purpose of patient portals and how their perspective differs from that of physicians. The findings show that developers and physicians have different views on whether and how the portals can help achieve transparency, efficiency, and patient empowerment. This misalignment emerges because each group makes sense of the portal through a different frame of how they see patient data, medical work, and patient behavior. The study also finds that developers cope with the frame differences by engaging in practices of coproducing, bypassing, and reframing. The implication of the study is that technological frame analysis needs to incorporate the growing complexity and institutional character of modern technology, the diversity of target groups it serves, and their corresponding frames. The study also suggests that developers, instead of being seen as mere operational IT support, may need to be seen as strategically important actor groups for healthcare organizations—since their practices matter for the strategic agenda of transforming healthcare into a more patient-centric practice

Brains exposed: How new imaging technology reconfigures expertise coordination in neurosurgery

This study explores the consequences of the uptake of novel medical technology for expertise coordination among specialists. Building on a 40-month field study, we show how the introduction of iMRI triggered a significant change in temporal, interactional and role dimensions of coordination. We trace the origin of those changes to the novel role the images started to play in surgery: iMRI generated new forms of visibility of the brain (offering real-time, more precise imaging) and new forms of ambiguity for clinical action (representing the brain undergoing manipulation). In response to this dual nature of images, specialists reconfigured how they engage with each other: aligning temporal rhythms of their corresponding work practices, shifting their interactions to focus more on dialog and synchronous mutual exploration of images, and delegating increased weight to radiological judgement for guiding immediate surgical action. We discuss the implications of our findings for research on expertise coordination and on the consequences of novel medical technologies for situated practice

In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man Is King: Knowledge Brokerage in the Age of Learning Algorithms

This paper presents research on how knowledge brokers attempt to translate opaque algorithmic predictions. The research is based on a 31-month ethnographic study of the implementation of a learning algorithm by the Dutch police to predict the occurrence of crime incidents and offers one of the first empirical accounts of algorithmic brokers. We studied a group of intelligence officers, who were tasked with brokering between a machine learning community and a user community by translating the outcomes of the learning algorithm to police management. We found that, as knowledge brokers, they performed different translation practices over time and enacted increasingly influential brokerage roles, namely, those of messenger, interpreter, and curator. Triggered by an impassable knowledge boundary yielded by the black-boxed machine learning, the brokers eventually acted like “kings in the land of the blind” and substituted the algorithmic predictions with their own judgments. By emphasizing the dynamic and influential nature of algorithmic brokerage work, we contribute to the literature on knowledge brokerage and translation in the age of learning algorithms