Before I begin with Dervin’s Sense-making theory however, I would like to focus on the assumption behind the theory as it is a significant departure from anything that came before it in the field. The primary assumption of Dervin’s Sense-making theory is the assumption of discontinuity. It proposes that reality is fundamentally characterized by discontinuities that exist between entities (living and otherwise), between times, and between spaces. It is assumed that discontinuity is a constant of nature generally and the human condition specifically. The position essentially stipulates that there are no tools people can use to arrive at more comprehensive and stable understanding of reality. Discontinuity assumes that whatever reality is out there, that reality itself is potentially discontinuous.
While I find that this assumption applies very well to the human condition I am much more cautious to attribute discontinuity to the ‘nature’ of the universe. For an assumption that suggests that no tools can be used to arrive at a ‘more’ stable understanding of reality, it seems to me that assuming discontinuity is a constant aspect of reality is contradictory. Dervin also seems to avoid mentioning the philosophical underpinnings and origin of the assumption of Discontinuity.
Admittedly, what is powerful about this assumption is the idea that what may hold true for one given context (or time-space as Dervin likes to refer to it) may not hold true for another. Furthermore, Dervin makes an excellent point about theories that assume information has an existence apart from human constructions, a point with significant implications on Information science practice. She suggests that making such an assumption will focus research exclusively on the transmission of information instead of the way people construct their understanding given a situation when information transference is occurring. For example, the question ‘Was the information they got accurate?’ is very different to asking “What strategy did they apply that led them to call the information accurate?’. It seems to me the latter question is much more characteristic of a present day approach to Information science where as the former seems almost like a question characteristic of the systems based approach.
It is also worth noting here that although the cognitive approach deals with the way information processing is mediated by a system of pre-existing categories or concepts that are held by a user (and hence the cognitivist claim that they are user centered), it is still grounded in this assumption that information is objective (as can be seen in the post about Brookes and Popper). The assumption of discontinuity shows why Dervin’s theories are particularly revolutionary in the field and also why in the most recent reading in this week’s reading list, there is so much incoherence between practitioners (many of which took on Dervin as a cognitivist) who claim to hold a user-centered approach.
The theory of Sense-making re-conceptualizes the individual not as a single entity but as an entity behaving at a specific moment in time-space. The individual defines and attempts to bridge epistemological and ontological discontinuities or ‘gaps’.
It is this focus on gap-defining and gap-bridging which is seen as offering a way of introducing order to conceptualizations of individual behavior. The theory holds that the link between individuals, structures, institutions and cultures are communication behaviors and that the individual’s relationship to these entities is a matter of self construction. Sense-making is essentially a generalizable methodology developed for the study of all situations that involve communicating. Furthermore, it has a focus on transituational studies – which steers clear from making claims about a person in an absolute way by focusing on understanding behavior as situational.
Some of the different Sense-making interview methods are outlined below:
- Studies of Satisfaction – uses sense making triangle to focus on what ‘helps’ respondents find, barriers they experienced and what they thought caused those barriers.
- Studies of Images – uses sense making triangle to focus what ideas the respondent sees themselves as having according to a situation and what impacts these ideas had on their behaviour.
- Help Chain – focuses on how the respondent constructs the connection between information, system or structure and self. The chaining involves repeated questioning of the respondent until the respondent feels the statement of help has been made in the most personal and life-relevant terms.
- Message qing – focuses on respondents sense-making ability. Respondent are asked to focus on elements of a message which involved gap-defining and/or gap-bridging in some way. The element may have led the respondent to have an idea, or face a confusion, and so on.
Some of the methods used for the Sense-making approach are demonstrated by Dervin’s study: In moments of concern: A sense-making study of pregnant, drug-addicted women and their information needs.
The study offers a strong example of Sense-Making theory in practice. It employs one on one interviews and uses the micro-moment time-line interview method. It divides steps taken by an individual during their information behaviour into the events, gaps and the helps categories.
Fig 1. An example of a micro management time-line interview (Dervin 1992)
After this step, recorded interviews with respondents are transcribed and analysed according to Dervin’s Triangle.
Here, analysis was conducted with regard to respondents’ ‘definings’ of their situations, questions and uses of information as sense-making theory holds that information seeking is more likely to occur in response to variables inherent in situations rather than inherent in individuals.
Dervin’s study made it possible to identify the actual information needs of the respondents with great specificity. It indicated that intrapersonal and interpersonal communication were very important to the respondents. The Sense-Making interviews made it clear that drug addicted pregnant women will not seek help from social service or information systems unless these systems and their representatives honor needs for validation, support, and encouragement. The research evidently has significant implications for information practices employed by prevention programs and advertising campaigns surrounding the issue of drug addicted pregnancy. Notably, it is difficult to see how a cognitive study which would focus on the way information processing is mediated by a system of pre-existing categories or concepts, held by the drug addicted pregnant women, would arrive at a similar conclusion.
Finally, I would like to look into the more recent study by Dervin: Researchers and practitioners talk about users and each other. Making user and audience studies matter: paper 1.
Given the context of some of the ‘sense un-making’ (as discussed in class) I’ve had to do with regards to this week’s learning, this final paper was particularly frustrating for me, as it forced me to do a bit of sense un-making of the previous two texts I’ve just written about. The reading has revealed user studies as a hotly contested field with a long way to go before it develops a homogenous set of concrete theories and practices across the field.
The study recognises the importance of communication activity in building (and breaking) bridges between disciplines and perspectives. The study tries to pay systematic attention to how communicating is practiced across three fields; human computer interaction and communication/media studies, library and information science. It sets itself the ambitious goal of documenting the terrain of user studies given that, while individually some in their fields may feel as if progress is being made, collectively user studies appear to be in disarray.
The study begins arguing that users are no longer best conceptualized as users or as audiences and that the best approach is to use the term ‘persons with agency’. This assertion is made given the context of the rapid advance of electronic technologies where the neat divide between users and audiences is beginning to erode. Furthermore, it identifies that in the given context information, communication and media institutions are themselves going through significant changes and that the divide between audiences and users was a constructed one given the constraints of communication structures.
What particularly sparked my interested about this study was the concept of Dialogic surround. Dialogic surround is a method that procedurally implements repeated rounds of communicating in dialogues where the intent is to allow people to actively sense-make out of how others construct their worlds as opposed to rejecting arguments and building resistance.
The three basic needs for this process to function are:
1) Understanding and thinking about self;
2) Understanding and thinking about others;
3) Sharing and advancing own views to others
And Dervin claims that these processes rarely occur at the same time. The study concludes that traditional modes used for communication is not working for user studies. Dervin proposes the concept of Dialogic Surround to deal with this problem, however her second paper goes on note that the concept has received significant resistance and that it was claimed that dialogic communicating merely increases confusion rather than decreases it. Dervin concedes that they are right in making this claim, however, she states that such confusion is meant to do so in a way that encourages and facilitates internal sense-making of ourselves and others. Dervin envisions a sense-making of the kind that will allow people in the field to be enriched despite their confusion and more specifically, not alienated and better equipped to incorporate what can be seen as useful strengths in the works of others.
By in large, I believe the dialogical concept is an extremely important one, which not only has important ramifications for the field, but for all of society and its various institutions. I find it disappointing and frustrating that the concept hasn’t gained much weight, but it seems precisely the kind of approach that user studies requires to bring together what seems like a very fragmented field.
Sources:
Dervin, B. (1992). From the Mind's Eye of the User: the sense-Making qualitative-quantitative methodology. In: J. Glazier and R. Powell. Qualitative Research in Information Management. Englewood, Co.: Libraries Unlimited: 61-84.
Dervin, B. (2006) 'Researchers and practitioners talk about users and each other. Making user and audience studies matter—paper 1' 'Information Research, 12(1) paper 286 Available at http://informationr.net/ir/12-1/paper286.html
Dervin, B. (2006) 'Beyond communication: research as communication. Making user and audience studies matter—paper 2' 'Information Research, 12(1) paper 287 Available at http://informationr.net/ir/12-1/paper287.html
Dervin, B., Harpring, J., and Foreman-Wernet, L. (1999). In moments of concern: A Sense-Making study of pregnant, drug-addicted women and their information needs. The Electronic Journal of Communication [Online serial], 9 (2, 3,and 4)
No comments:
Post a Comment