Adaptive Hypermedia - Adaptivity Versus Adaptability

Adaptivity Versus Adaptability

An interesting aspect of adaptive hypermedia is that it makes distinction between adaptation (system-driven personalisation and modifications) and adaptability (user-driven personalisation and modifications). One way of looking at it is that adaptation is automatic, whereas adaptability is not. From an epistemic point of view, adaptation can be described as analytic, a-priori, whereas adaptability is synthetic, a-posteriori. In other words, any adaptable system, as it "contains" a human, is by default "intelligent", whereas an adaptive system that presents "intelligence" is more surprising and thus more interesting. This conforms with the general preference of the adaptive hypermedia research community, which considers adaptation more interesting. However, the truth of adaptive hypermedia systems is somewhere in the middle, combining and balancing adaptation and adaptability.