P for Political: Participation is Not Enough

Is participatory design outdated in Scandinavia? Many would say it is. Yet, as information Systems (IS) diffusion continues in familiar and new guises, IS researchers and developers face political dilemmas through the conduct of their work. These are precisely the original area of concern for the research area of Participatory Design (PD). How, then to make PD better reflect contemporary concerns? This paper argues the danger of complacency among Scandinavian IS researchers about the position and meaning of PD: Some researchers reject PD altogether; some who previously have contributed to PD speak of new circumstances making it harder or less relevant today. The paper critically examines a number of such arguments. In a world made “global” by information and communication technologies (ICTs), political concerns remain of the minds of many. PD must encompass work motivated in political conscience which is expressed through a range of approaches and conducted at multiple points throughout the processes of computer development and adoption, not only participatory design. In this sense, PD needs to become broader. Further, participatory design work which does not contribute to challenging patterns of dominance or understanding how to do so currently remain within PD. This is another problem for PD and in this sense the area needs to become more focused. In sum, PD must develop a stronger demand for analyses of societal/political/ethical consequences of ICT development, management, adoption or use. Thus, systems design would be one of several foci contributors might address. To indicate the range of new possibilities for activism, issues are suggested that might benefit from enquiry motivated in concern for dominated groups

Means and Meanings of Research Collaboration in the Face of a Suffering Earth : A Landscape of Questions

Peer reviewe

On Participatory Design in Scandinavian Computing Research 1

computing researc

Computers in Education: What for?

The assumption that increased use of computing technologies is beneficial per se has been questioned in research on workplace computing since the early 1970ies. It is interesting, then, to note how easily such assumptions have become part of the landscape within Education research. The intention of this paper is to encourage stopping and pausing to consider what is happening (an empirical question), and whether what is seen is desirable (a normative question). The paper calls for more debate (among researchers, teachers, parents, school leaders, governmental bodies, and other interested parties) as to what we would want computers for and how to get there. Points of view would differ; possibly never fully settling on agreement. This would constitute an ideal and a practice of attempting to bring Bildung and democracy to computing use in education, and would be a worthwhile lead to equip the young for participation in a technology-intensive society. The issue should be addressed, however, taking into account critiques of normative approaches. In particular, incorporating insight from research which critically examines ways in which scientific truths and their technical counterparts become established, would aid an understanding of why and how obstacles exist. Such a broad exploration would imply further questions about how the maintenance of boundaries between scientific approaches affects applied questions such as the one posed in the title. This paper, then, carries a two-level argument

Exploring and Supporting Today's Collaborative Writing

Collaborative writing has become increasingly common and complex. Many researchers in Human Computer Interaction (HCI) have conducted extensive research on this topic for the last 25 years. Technologies were built and tested in the laboratory. I continue this stream of work by revisiting computer-supported collaborative writing within today’s context. Today, many commercially available word processors have built-in features to support collaboration, such as supporting synchronous editing and archiving editing history. Now that these features are available outside laboratories, how are people actually using these new capabilities in the wild? In my dissertation project, I aim to explore this question using both quantitative and qualitative research methods. In addition, to analyze the collaborative writing practices utilizing the detailed behavioral data traces, I have built an information visualization system, DocuViz, that complements existing research methods. This dissertation work contributes both a visualization system and the novel research approach of using these visualizations to study collaborative writing. This work also reveals various features and practices that people use to write collaboratively. By quantifying collaboration markers, such as styles of work or participation equity, the statistical analyses reveal the relationships between the practices that people use and the quality of the documents that they produce. Our results suggest that people write collaboratively more often than they used to, and they use various styles of working (e.g., outline then divide and conquer or template) to coordinate their collaborations. A few factors (e.g., power dynamics, privacy, and community’s norms) influence the practices that people choose. Some group behaviors (e.g., having a leader or equal participation) are associated with higher quality outcomes. In summary, I construct a holistic understanding of the users’ perceptions and practices that they developed in adapting to today’s collaborative writing technology. By synthesizing both the findings from my research and previous literature, I extend the existing research framework of collaborative writing, propose behavioral guidelines for users who want to write together better, and generate design implications for system designers. In addition, I offer two visualization tools used in this research that might be useful to authors themselves as well as to future research

On scale, dialectics, and affect: pathways for proliferating participatory design

The Participatory Design (PD) community is committed to continuously refine its technological, social, political, and scientific agenda, and as a result, PD has become more widely adopted, robust, and sophisticated. Yet, PD’s advancement cannot end here. The gap between those who can contribute to the shaping of future technologies and those who are reduced to consumers, has – if anything – widened on a grand scale. In response, we argue through three lenses: scale, dialectics, and affect in PD, and suggest some pathways to build bridges, foster alliances, and evolve PD practice to proliferate the democratisation in technology design that has been a strong value driving PD. Scale asks about ways for PD to extend its reach without giving up on its core qualities. Dialectics is about creating and maintaining the spaces and fora for constructive conflict by networking and linking with other stakeholders, organisations, and domains. Finally, affect discusses how PD can put forward democratic visions of technological futures that connect to people’s hearts, acknowledging that decisions are often made irrationally and unconsciously. Our review draws attention to opportunities for PD to travel between different contexts and proliferate through interconnected and intermediary knowledge and an embodied literacy that enables PD to reach further into industry, government, and community