Design of Information
System in Context of Social
Informatics
MICHAL LORENZ
DIVISION OF INFORMATION AND
LIBRARY STUDIES
FACULTY OF ARTS
MASARYK UNIVERSITY
Contents
I. Productivity paradox
II. Information Systems failures
III. Social informatics
IV. Context in HCI
• Situated action models • Activity theory
• Distributed cognition • Social informatics
V. Methods of social contextual
design
• Contextual inquiry • Socio-technical walkthrough
• Ethnographic analysis • Social design of computing
Productivity paradox
 Accelerating development of technologies – is
society able to adapt fast enough?
 Lag after development of new technologies
examples:
- laws is lagging behind development of
technologies
- productivity paradox – growth of productivity
is lagging behind investments to innovations of
information technologies
Productivity paradox
 productivity paradox - social phenomenon
computerization of society
 massive investments to IT to reach higher
performance
 outcome: work productivity descent instead
different explanations:
→ inappropriate measuring of the productivity
→ the growth come after the capital stock gets over a
limit on the national level
→
Productivity paradox
 But: gain is hard to express as raise of throughput
productivity
 delay effect of society computerization
- delay effect known before
→ implementation new technologies to complex social
environment – typography over 100 years, dynamo
60 years
Productivity paradox
 establishing systems:
 aims to change technologies separately rarely brings
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

transformation benefits
establishing systems and technologies with respect to
social hierarchies and work procedures improve
performance of organizations
society doesn't lag behind development of
technologies
development of technologies often follows inadequate
description of work
adaptation of design of technologies to needs of
society
Contents
I. Productivity paradox
II. Information Systems failures
III. Social informatics
IV. Context in HCI
• Situated action models • Activity theory
• Distributed cognition • Social informatics
V. Methods of social contextual
design
• Contextual inquiry • Socio-technical walkthrough
• Ethnographic analysis • Social design of computing
Information Systems failures
 technological determinism - systems the only thing
needed for organization improvement
 a lot of problems arisen after implementation in
retrogressive assessment reveal they were predictable
 systems don't facilitate work in organizations
 must take into account:
→ what users actually do
→ smooth transition between pre-defined set of tasks
and unstructured tasks
Information Systems failures
 systems need great deal of skills to cope with
 "stealth spending" - cost of learning to master the
system
peer support
 enigmatic behavior of the system
→ confusion among users
→ stopped their work
 social system enabling collaboration - the rapid solutions
and positive adoption of users
 right balance of social system - does not depend just on
technology, should be analyzed and incorporated into
system design
→
Contents
I. Productivity paradox
II. Information Systems failures
III. Social informatics
IV. Context in HCI
• Situated action models • Activity theory
• Distributed cognition • Social informatics
V. Methods of social contextual
design
• Contextual inquiry • Socio-technical walkthrough
• Ethnographic analysis • Social design of computing
Social informatics
 1996, workshop Social Aspects of Digital Libraries, Uni
of California
 multi-disciplinary field studies:
→ deals with the social aspect of computerization
→ ways how to change social practices together with
establishing systems and technologies
→ interdisciplinary study of the design, uses and
consequences of information technologies that
takes into account their interaction with
institutional and cultural contexts [Kling]
Social informatics
 improving control of systems
 social consequences of the decision
 basic findings based on empirical research
 Key findings of social informatics:
→ configurability
of ICT: specific configuration of
ICT components and social use, constitute system as
a unique socio-technical network
→ ICT follow trajectories: developmental history of
products (configurability) directed social history and
technological advances
Social informatics
→ co-evolution
of ICT: system design and its use
develop jointly - discourse between designers and
users is a relevant social factor
→ ethical implications of ICT use : tool shape goals of
people who use them, values intended by
developers can influence users
→ ICT is not value neutral: technologies are value
containing tools, technology are designed to support
social and organizational structures, their use creates
winners and losers [Sawyer, Rosenbaum]
Social informatics
→ ICT
has multiple consequences depending on the
context of their use, often paradoxical, unintended
→ social and organizational dynamics depends on the
context of the use, ICTs are not independent of the
situational context
Contents
I. Productivity paradox
II. Information Systems failures
III. Social informatics
IV. Context in HCI
• Situated action models • Activity theory
• Distributed cognition • Social informatics
V. Methods of social contextual
design
• Contextual inquiry • Socio-technical walkthrough
• Ethnographic analysis • Social design of computing
Context in HCI
 contextual approach - interaction between users and
computers in human context
 opposition to cognitive approach
 contextual approach to HCI - several versions
 Situated action models
→ normal activities of users in a specific situation
configuration
→ opposite to the cognitive and structured social
relations approaches
Context in HCI
→ particular sequence of moments of activities, action
growing up of the situation directly
→ environment in which users act constitute the
institutional framework
→ permanent structures such as plans are deliberately
disregarded - behaviorist approach
→ results - particulate studies can not be assigned to
universal framework
→ neglect consideration of intentionality of human
activity and broader context
Context in HCI
 Activity theory
→ the role of artifacts in everyday life, asymmetric
relationship between human beings and instruments
– consciousness
→ practice - how the activity is carried out
→ actions and operation - routinized and unconscious
aspects of action
→ artefacts are persistent structures linking different
activities over time and space, include instruments,
characters and signs, language and machines
Context in HCI
→ context is the activity itself, includes:
activities, subject: human/community, objectives:
intended, unintended, artifacts: allow and limit
action, set the whole context
→ internal dimension (the objective of people), external
dimension (artifacts, other people)
→ only social factors influencing individual, not activity
of social units
Context in HCI
 Distributed cognition
→ systemic level, opposed to individual cognitive level
→ how is knowledge represented in the minds and in
environment, how is distributed among different peoples
and artefacts
 process of transformation of these structures
 detailed analysis of specific artifacts and coordination
between human beings
 real situations, analysis of working techniques
 connects the context with the role of persistent structures
Context in HCI
 Social informatics
→ context - social, cultural and technological dimensions
→ social context influences use of information and
technologies → consequences for work, organizations
and other social relationships
→ underrated aspect of social system: organizational
setting, users and their current situation, working
practices
→ institutional context (system of incentives)
cultural context (groups of practicioners)
wider social context (development of institutions)
→ situation in the context creates the context for the next
situation
Context in HCI
→The whole context is relationship between different social
situations
→ context relations between technology and society
- ICT in social context – technologies are different from
society, functional and instrumental analysts
- ICT as part of social context - technology has a social
nature, interaction of technology and society is seamless,
context for socio-technical analysts
- ICT have technological and social context - interwaves
technological/social aspects - inseparable from technology
- ICT are primarily social - technology is socially
constructed, social reductionism
Contents
I. Productivity paradox
II. Information Systems failures
III. Social informatics
IV. Context in HCI
• Situated action models • Activity theory
• Distributed cognition • Social informatics
V. Methods of social contextual
design
• Contextual inquiry • Socio-technical walkthrough
• Ethnographic analysis • Social design of computing
Methods of social contextual design
 Contextual inquiry
 users engaged in dialogue during common activities
– comments, explanations, opinions, reasons
 data on behavior and perceptions in the short time
period
 qualitative data, quantitative data - perceived and
observed task success
 use: common tasks which follows the "continued
use" situation - use of search engines
Methods of social contextual design
 Socio-technical walkthrough
 factors allowing to affect working process with regard to
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social interaction
diagrams representing the relationship between the
various roles, activities, documents and artifacts
the pre-set questions, questions from other participants
resulting system design is based on multiple variants of
models and shared understanding of users and designers
use: services related to logistics of organizations based on
user interaction
Methods of social contextual design
 Ethnographic analysis of cooperative interaction
 how the order of work is socially produced
→ sequentiality and temporality: sequences of action , context for
placing of activities
→ working division of labor: monitored in practice, coordinate
and facilitate work of others
→ plans and procedures – explicit, orient work or limit current
work
→ routines, rhytms, patterns - operational level, revealed in the
doing
→ distributed coordination - related to motivation
→ awareness of work
→ ecology and affordances - activities in relation, an arangement
of configuration of system
Methods of social contextual design
 Social design of computing
 monitored function as livability, sustainability, usability
 usefulness - the ability of the computer system to meet the
needs of the users
 identifies various social units - organization, teams,
communities and their social processes
 analysis of ICT policy – who makes decision, how design
decisions related to source of influences in organizations,
benefits for the stakeholder, evaluation criteria
 design does not finalize by process of delivery of system but
continues during its use - education and training of users