Research
Historically, social informatics research has been strong in the Scandinavian countries, the UK and Northern Europe. Within North America, the field is represented largely through independent research efforts at a number of diverse institutions.
Social informatics research diverges from earlier, deterministic (both social and technological) models for measuring the social impacts of technology. Such technological deterministic models characterized information technologies as tools to be installed and used with a pre-determined set of impacts on society dictated by the technology’s stated capabilities. Similarly, the socially deterministic theory represented by some proponents of the social construction of technology (SCOT) or social shaping of technology theory as advocated by Williams & Edge (1996) see technology as the product of human social forces. In contrast, some social informatics methodologies consider the context surrounding technology and the material properties of the technology to be equally important: the people who will interact with a system, the organizational policies governing work practice, and support resources. This contextual inquiry produces "nuanced conceptual understanding" of systems that can be used to examine issues like access to technology, electronic forms of communication, and large-scale networks.
Research in social informatics can be categorized into three orientations. Normative research focuses on the development of theories based on empirical analysis that may be used to develop organizational policies and work practices. The heart of such analyses lies in socio-technical interaction networks, a framework built around the idea that humans and the technologies they build are “co-constitutive”, bound together, and that any examination of one must necessarily consider the other. Studies of the analytical orientation develop theory or define methodologies to contribute to theorizing in institutional settings. Critical analysis, like Lucy Suchman’s examination of articulation work, examine technological solutions from non-traditional perspectives in order to influence design and implementation.
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