The intellectual challenge of CSCW: The gap between social requirements and technical feasibility

被引:296
作者
Ackerman, MS [1 ]
机构
[1] Univ Calif Irvine, CORPS Grp, Irvine, CA 92697 USA
来源
HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION | 2000年 / 15卷 / 2-3期
基金
美国国家科学基金会;
关键词
D O I
10.1207/S15327051HCI1523_5
中图分类号
TP3 [计算技术、计算机技术];
学科分类号
0812 ;
摘要
Over the last 10 years, Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) has identified a base set of findings. These findings are taken almost as assumptions within the field. In summary, they argue that human activity is highly flexible, nuanced, and contextualized and that computational entities such as information sharing roles, and social norms need to be similarly flexible, nuanced, and contextualized. However, current systems cannot fully support the social world uncovered by these findings. In this article I argue that there is an inherent gap between the social requirements of CSCW and its technical mechanisms. The social-technical gap is the divide between what we know we must support socially and what we can support technically. Exploring, understanding, and hopefully ameliorating this social-technical gap is the central challenge for CSCW as a field and one of the central problems for human-computer interaction. Indeed, merely attesting the continued centrality of this gap could be one of the important intellectual contributions of CSCW. I also argue that the challenge of the social-technical gap creates an opportunity to refocus CSCW.
引用
收藏
页码:179 / 203
页数:25
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