Research as an information systems domain - Information Systems Foundations: Constructing and Criticising - page 146

the scientist's use of the community's information; and scientific collaboration,
allowing dynamic groupings to tackle emergent research problems.
E-Research is a broader term that, Cram (2003) says, 'concerns the ways that Researchers,
Research Students, Scholars and Entrepreneurs use and will use Information and Com-
munications Technologies (ICT)' in the context of innovation and knowledge application'.
He argues 'Research is to Innovation as Sunlight is to Photosynthesis'. The first theme
of this paper, then, is: recognising research as a systematic, human activity that can make
use of the 'big ICT' envisaged in e-Science
In a major Australian Department of Education, Science and Training (DEST) study,
'Changing Research Practices in the Digital Information and Communication Environ-
ment', released in late 2003, Prof. John W. Horton has reviewed the current and future
directions for research. The changing nature of research, who does it, how it is funded,
what research practices are in use and the role of ICT are discussed at length, and key
findings about the systems needed to underlie research in the future are presented.
To an information systems person, however, Horton is trapped in a traditional view of
knowledge. While his study covers knowledge production and its dissemination in
documents, it does not cover its use . His view is that ICT can contribute to collaboration
between researchers' access to knowledge as part of the production process and the
publishing of knowledge. But what of its deployment and use to achieve human ends?
Consequently, the second theme of this paper is: recognising the use of research, not just
its production .
For the reasons underlying the two themes of this paper, research is a suitable domain
for IS attention. This paper will use the term e-Research to mean IS work in the research
domain.
Information systems
Information Systems (IS) is an active, interventionist discipline that mobilises information
and knowledge so people can effectively take knowledgeable, informed actions in their
organisational and social setting. It is concerned with understanding and formalising
areas of human activity and developing IT-based systems that responsibly intervene in
those areas for the benefit of all stakeholders. The shape of IS practice is a bit like the
middle loop in Figure 12.1: analysis, modelling, systems construction and intervention
in a human activity system.
Figure 12.1. A general model of information systems activity.
The outer components in the diagram show some of the generic theories, tools and
techniques used in the process of IS work. The theories and understandings from onto-