Research
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE I have to find this paper :
Spatial model of awareness [Viller, 1999 #397] see [Cockburn, 1999 #76] for review Benford, S., C. Brown, et al. (1996). Shared spaces: Transportation, artificiality, and spatiality. Proceedings of the ACM CSCW '96 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, New York, Association for Computing Machinery.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Found here
A Schelling point is a solution that people will tend to converge on in the absence of communication, because it seems natural or 'special' to them.
Ex.: You and a friend have to try to pick the same number from the following sequence:
2, 5, 9, 25, 69, 73, 82, 96, 100, 126, 150
Which number do you pick?
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE I was thinking about analyzing mediated (SMS, mobile phones ?) interactions (people among a group) in terms of space. I should build a grid for content analysis. An interesting question could be to check whether there are references to spatial information or not. These references could be implicit or explicit. If there are references to spatial information : absolute location or relative location. If iit is relative information : reference to a specific place or to a mean of transport ?
how do the partner use spatial information??
mmh... so many information about space... so many questions to address...
I should choose among this list of processes involvbed in collaborationm the one that I have to study for my phd : Negotiation/grounding/mutual modelling/abstraction/group memory/mutual regualtion/division of labour/shared cognitive load/explanation/internalisation/appropriation
The idea is to study the impacts of space-based awareness (location...) on the chosen process. For instance, what are the effects of location awareness on mutual modelling ? Does spatial information contributes to the construction of a mental model of one's partner ?...
Attention à faire la part des choses entre des objectifs de recherche et ce qui est branché (la technologie quoi) ! le cheminement de ce compte-rendu reflète la réflexion que l'on aeu au cours de la discussion avec pierre, on en arrive à une ébauche de question de recherche vague... tout du moins d'idée de question de recherche
Mieux vaut focaliser sur la revue de littérature et trouver la dedans une question de recherche qui vaille la peine (donc mettre la technologie en arrière plan) -> Qu'est-ce qu'on peut soulever comme vraie question de recherche en terme d'espace ? il faut par exemple se rattacher aux notions sur l'espace : territoire, proxémique... en dehors de la technologie Il faut donc partir d'une idée fondementale. -> revue de littérature Espace, Awareness et Cognition.
Impact de l'espace sur le mutual modelling ? attention car le MM est lié à la tâche, il y a un impact lorsqu'il y a une forte relation entre tâche et espace. Le problème si l'on fait une expérience telle que mon petit projet avec de sgens qui ne se connaissent pas est que la tâche n'est pas claire. C'est dure d'avoir des impacts cognitifs,ce ser alors plutôt des impacts sociaux. Or ma thèse est plus "sciences cognitives" avec une composante social.
Attention aussi : il n'y a pas que l'espace social MAIS espace social + interaction. Les interactions donnent beaucoup d'information, plus que le spatial awareness tout seul.
Il faut trouver une population/tâche où l'espace a du sens !!!, tâche spatiale !
Exemple d'étude à faire : Est-ce que les gens adaptent leurs façons de s'exprimer suivant si ils savent ou non ou est l'autre ? Donc expérience plus ou moins controlée MAIS avec deux groupes : avec et sans l'outil permettant de savoir où est l'autre. Etude donc de la relation entre le mode d'interaction et le degré d'awareness.
Le truc c'est qu'il faut vraiment réfléchir si on fait une expérience controlée ou non... parce que ca risque d'etre dur/serré de tout contrôler...
effet de l'outil d'awareness sur l'appartenance au groupe (comment on opérationnalise cette variable ?)
!!!!!! L'IDEE QUI RESSORT de ce meeting : prendre un mécanisme qui a lieu dans la collaboration (grounding, mutual modelling, negotiation, abstraction (les paires ont une représentation plus abstratire qu'un individu) et voir l'impact du spatial/location awareness (de l'espace donc la dessus). POUR CELA, étude des interactions entre les participants d'un groupe et voir le lien avec l'espace la dedans (comment il est utilisé, si il y est fait référence...) Il s'agit de lier ma thèse à une question opérationnelle de psychologie (cognition et technologie), le but n'est pas forcément d'être innovant mais que le sujet soit intéressant d'un point de vue recherche fondamentale.
(le but de ma petite étude sur les SMS et l'espace est de comprendre - justement - les liens entre SMS et espace (coordination spatiale notamment). Voir si l'espace est utilisé/citer de manière explicite ou implicite ? comment les gens s'y réfèrent, est-ce que c'est meaningful ?
After having read a definition of collaboration on mediaTIC, I would like to give a more general view : Collaboration is a situation that involves two or more persons carrying out a joint activity. Three major features characterise a collaborative situation :
- The peers who collaborate have almost the same level considering the action they can perform, the knowledge and the skills they possess. This means that there must be, more or less, a degree of symmetry in the interactions performed by the participants of a collaborative activity.
- The participants share common goals or a common interest which is the reason of their interaction : performing a task. They also have personal goals (which are their own private motivation).
- There is a division of labour among the participants. Academics often distinguish cooperation and collaboration. The author states that In cooperation, partners split the work, solve sub-tasks individually and then assemble the partial results into the final output. In collaboration, partners work together. Collaboration also concerns the interactions which take place between the participants. First, a collaborative activity implies interactivity. That does not mean that what matters is the amount of interactions. In fact, the extent to which the interactions between group members influence the participants cognitive processes is a more accurate criterion to define the degree of interactivity. It is also often claims that carrying out a joint activity together (i.e. to collaborate) implies synchronous communication (whereas asynchronous communication is often used for cooperation). As a matter of fact, to work synchronously, participants need to interact synchronously. It must be stressed that negotiation is also an important feature during collaboration. Participants discusses, justify, argue and try to convince their partners. We should finally bear in mind that collaboration imply the same cognitive mechanisms as those which operate in individual cognition. Reasoning processes like induction, analogy-based reasoning or self-explanation are used, as well as cognitive load. Several academics have also stressed that collaboration can be seen as a problem solving task. Roschelle and Teasley (1995) state that: collaboration is a coordinated, synchronous activity that is the result of a continued attempt to construct and maintain a shared conception of a problem. They also propose the notion of joint problem space to explain what is going on during collaboration: ( ) Social interactions in the context of problem solving activity occur in relation to a Joint Problem Space (JPS). The JPS is a shared knowledge structure that supports problem solving activity by integrating (a) goals (b) descriptions of the current problem state, (c) awareness of available problem solving actions, and (d) associations that relate goals, features of the current problem state, and available actions." Hence, collaboration is a process of solving a problem and maintaining a shared conception of the situation (the JPS) by integrating information during the task. This understanding of the task is continually shaped and reshaped during the course of the interaction. Consequently, collaborative problem solving cannot only be seen as sharing tasks. As a matter of fact, collaboration implies interactions between participants, the effort of maintaining a shared understanding of the situation and taking into account the aims and the expectations of the group.
Building this shared conception can be carried out by:
- The possibility of introducing new information to the shared representation of the problem.
- The fact that the participants can be aware of the possible divergence of opinion or representations.
- The possibility of repairing those divergences of representations. Therefore, a collaborative technology must provide tools for supporting those functionalities. Unfortunately, computer-mediated collaboration has not kept up with the needs for people to effectively perform collective tasks. Working or playing together in a virtual environment has revealed the tremendous lack of human interactions that occur in co-located activities. That is why distributed teams (of players or workers) create a need for collaboration support
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Via anne, I fell on this Urban Tapestries project. This is "a framework for understanding the social, cultural, economic and political implications of pervasive location-based mobile and wireless systems.".
They built "an experimental location-based wireless platform to allow users to access and author location-specific content (text, audio, pictures and movies)". This space is seen as "a forum for exploring and sharing experience and knowledge, for leaving and annotating ephemeral traces of peoples presence in the geography of the city."
This project, very relevant to my thesis, deals with the concept of Social Navigation. The authors are more interested in the social and politics impacts. I would prefer to deal with cognitive and social issues at a micro level (team of 5-10 people).
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE My current project will adress two questions :
1. How people build a representation of the location of their partner within a group (hanging out teenagers, skateboarding clique, dispersed workers, students ) ? 2. Are information about space meaningful for group members ? how information about space are conveyed (what media )
It will be a qualitative analysis using both log diaries (users among a group of 5 persons will report all SMS sent and receive as well as their position and the expected position of the adressee) and focus groups.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE I have seen that my work on awareness tools in video-games has been linked by the futurelab ! It rocks !
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Un de mes collègues du CRAFT (le laboratoire de recherche en technologie éducative où je travaille) me fait ces remarques suite à mon compte-rendu de la conférence CSCL :
"Beaucoup de prof du poly n'aiment pas faire travailler les étudiants en groupe invoquant que c'est toujours le même qui bosse et les autres qui en profitent. Ces grands-écarts entre la recherche et le terrain me font me poser cette question: sommes-nous au service des enseignants avant-gardistes (avec les risques darwiniens que cela comporte) ou avons nous pour mission d'essayer d'élever le niveau du plus grand nombre?"
Ma réponse :
Tes commentaires au compte rendu de la conférence CSCL nous donnent en effet l'occasion de confronter deux visions qui forment l'ossature du craft. L'e-mail n'est peut être pas vraiment le bon format pour en discuter, d'autant plus que d'autres que moi pourraient argumenter quant à cette problématique. Néanmoins, je tiens à livrer mon avis (non exhaustif et écrit dans la hâte :)
Il s'agit effectivement de discuter des liens entre recherche fondamentale (en tant que doctorant je m'inscris la dedans) et application/évaluation de projets (où se place Jean Louis entre autre). L'objet de la recherche en pédagogie/technologie éducative et donc son corollaire, les idées qui en découlent (par exemple l'étude des interactions au sein des groupes de travail ou encore l'étude des effets de telle technologie dans telle contexte) ne sont pas, à mon sens, vouées à être toutes appliquées telles qu'elles. D'une part parce que le transfert de résultats d'expérimentations conduites en conditions controlées et dans des situations/types de tâches particuliers n'est pas trivial. D'autre part parce que d'autres facteurs (comme l'acceptation par l'enseignant comme Jean Louis le cite) sont de véritables résistances pour l'application de ces innovations.
Alors finalement on peut me rétorquer : à quoi peut servir la recherche fondamentale ? Attardons nous sur l'utilité des résultats de recherche pour l'enseignant qui voudrait introduire des technologies éducatives dans son activité. La recherche peut aider à désambiguiser ces mêmes technologies en en montrant le potentiel pour les étudiants (ainsi que pour l'enseignant lui-même soit dit en passant, je renvois aux outils de gestion de projets sur lesquels travaillent Patrick, Sandrine et Maniratan notamment). De plus, elle peut également montrer l'utilité de tel modèle pédagogique dans tel type de contexte (par exemple : le behaviorisme est plus utile pour apprendre les tables de mulitplication que le tatonnement constructiviste). Les études sur les différents modèles pédagogiques permettent donc d'enrichir les différentes manières de concevoir un cours (en alternant plusieurs modèles d'enseignement : de l'apprentissage situé au socio-constructivisme). Ensuite, l'utilisation de technologie éducatives peuvent susciter le questionnement et la refonte des cours de certains enseignants en permettant la prise de conscience d'autres critères qui ne paraissaient pas évident a priori. Ce peut aussi être le moyen de coupler l'enseignement de thèmatiques annexes mais nécessaires (par exemple, souvent le fait que les cours projets soit en groupe et à distance implique que les étudiants aient de bonne notion de gestion de projets).
Je considère pour ma part la recherche comme un vivier de connaissances dans lequel ceux qui le désirent (en l'occurence l'enseignant voulant utiliser des technologies éducatives dans son cours par exemple) peuvent puiser pour y trouver des idées, des méthodes, des contraintes (par exemple : le Miller's magic number seven qui dit, d'après une étude de psychologie expérimentale, que l'être humain ne retient que 7+/-2 items en mémoire à court terme :). Finalement, faut-il fournir un pourcentage du type "si 30% de nos idées sont appliquées, c'est bien" ? Je ne le crois pas, l'essence même de notre travail en recherche est plutot à mon avis de faire "remonter" de la connaissance, des idées pour aider/déclencher d'autres idées chez d'autres gens en fournissant des repère des potentialités tant des technologies que des impacts sociaux et cognitifs qu'elle occasionnent. Pierre rajoute :
Le point noir est : si les techologies consistent uniquement à reproduire une pratique d'exposé ex-cathedra que l'on veut réduire, elles n'ont pas beaucoup d'intérêt. A l'inverse, si l'adoption des technologies exige que le prof change complètement son mode d'enseignement, seul quelques profs très motivés s'y mettront. Donc, l'idéal sont des technologies qui trouvent le juste milieu,assez compatibles aux pratiques pour être adoptées et assez innovantes pour être utiles à quelque chose.
L'absence de collaboration entre enseignants est une maladie grave de l'enseignement, à tous les niveaux d'enseignement. Dans les milieux primaires et secondaires, il existe maintenant des communautés on-line très vivantes, par ex. 'prof de bio pour gymnase francophone', qui s'échangent du matériel, des images, des idées, des questions,... L'objectif est de mettre davantage en réseau les profs de l'epfl qui collaborent avec 243 collègues en matière de recherche et pas en matière d'enseignement. On ne vas pas changer les mentalités en 1 jour, mais c'est de notre devoir de les faire réfléchir à des choses telles que "le livre de votre voisin de couloir est-il vraiment inutilisable dans votre cours?'
Il existe de très nombreux travaux sur l'efficacité de l'apprentissage en groupe, efficacité avérée dans environ 2/3 des études; des travaux sur quand, comment et pourquoi ca marche. Notre job n'est pas d'accepter tout ce les profs disent sinon le Craft ne servirait pas à grand chose, mais de leur expliquer, les convaincre, les... former. Le développement du travail en groupe est une des composantes du modèle de formation active que le craft est chargé de développer au sein de l'EPFL.
Les 2!!!! Il faut miser sur les avant-gardistes et investir sur les autres (sauf les hyper-reac). Mais, PLEASE, ne tombons pas dans les clichés qui opposent pratique et recherche. Toutes les systèmes présentés à cette conférencesont été testés dans des vraies classes, avec de vrais profs et de vrais étudiants, bref exactement sur le terrain. Un enseignant qui réfléchit à son enseignement, qui se pose des questions te essaie d'y répondre est déjà presqu'un chercheur. En outre, tous les chercheurs de ces communautés sont aussi des enseignants. Cehercheurs et practiciens travaillent dans des mondes avec des contraintes différentes, mais ne faisons pas de ces différences une opposition !
Last week-end, I was really concentrated on reading articles about mobile phones while in the train : - Grinter, R.E. & Eldridge R., M.A. (2001). "Y do tngrs luv 2 txt msg?" (Why do teenagers love to texte messages". Proceedings of the European CSCW Conference, 16-20 September 2001, Bonn, Germany. This paper presented interesting and relevant facts regarding SMS : 63% of messages are sent from teenagers' own houses -> the use of texte message is preferred even though telephones are available. The report also rport on the misunderstandings associated with text message language (this reminds me a discussion with fab). Other facts reported : teenagers use text messaging to co-ordinate how and when to interact, revise and adjust arrangements and chat, The restrictive length of text messages allows users to forego conversational conventions and reduces time spent on the interaction, Text messaging is cheaper, allowing teenagers to manage their expenses using prepaid vouchers, Text messaging supports quiet, private communication, Text messaging changes the dynamics of teenage communication but not the content, Exchanges are shorter but richer, Communication by text message is in real time allowing teenagers to change plans at a moments notice. Good report about texting
- Richard Ling (2001) : The social juxtaposition of mobile telephone conversations and public spaces. This paper shows that mobile telephones used in public spaces contradicts the taken for granted notions of public behavior : modulation of voices (and the resulting forced eavesdropping and threats to the decorum of the situation) as well as the complexity of managing two sets of social contexts with the additional imposition of a virtual interaction mediated via the mobile telephone.
- Weilenmann, A., & Larsson, C. (2001): Local Use and Sharing of Mobile Phones. In B. Brown, N. Green & R. Harper (Eds.) Wireless World: Social and Interactional Aspects of the Mobile Age. Godalming and Hiedleburg: Springer Verlag, pp. 99-115. This very sound paper shows that cell phones are often shared among teenage groups. It describes different shared uses : sharing SMS messages (by reading the message aould or by showing the display to others), "hands-on" sharing (the sharing of content is done through several people actually handling the phone), "it is smetimes impossible to understand from various observations th whome the phone actually belongs". Cell phones are also shared with unknown others (for exchanging numbers for example)."The sharing of mobile phones observed in this study raises questions about the notion of the mobile phone as a personal device, belonging to and being used by one individual. (...) To a large extent the mobile phones of today are designed to be used by one single person at a time. People using the phones for collaborative purposes have to work around this. One approach could be to make the phones more flexible, supporting the private, individual use, as well as the collaborative, group-use described in this paper."
- Rich Ling and Birgitte Yttri (2002) Nobody sits at home and waits for the telephone to ring: Micro and hyper-coordination through the use of the mobile telephone". Telenor FoU Research paper (forthcoming). This paper propose a very nice model of the use of cell phones. Since it is very close to my work, I will summarize it later in a more graphic way, in order to represent better all thoses uses.
A short note about the methodology : it's interesting to see that in those studies, the methodology consist of overhearing others' conversations !!!!
I have read an interesting paper "Why people say where they are during mobile phone calls" form Eric Laurier (submitted to Environment and Planning D : Society and Space). The author presents the specific feature of mobile phone conversation : the giving of a geographical formulation as part of an opening of a phone call. Look Schlegoff (1972) who worked on the analyses of "locational formulations". Laurier's study deals with how space influence grounding in the context of nomadic workers. His methodology is quite odd ?????
How a spatio-temporal context is being mutually accomplished between the caller and the called. The answerer's locational formulation is setting up some kind of mutual sense of his/her context.
He examined two cases : - the caller asks "where are you ?" or the answerer says where he is before being asked. - the caller asks "where are you TODAY ?"
The problem of this paper is that the writer focuses on people who needs space for their jobs : space is embedded in the task. Hence it must be different for other users (hanging out youngsters for instance).
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Calvinos continuous and hidden cities
De Certeaus spatial stories
Castells, Manuel. 2001. The Castells Reader on Cities and Social Theory. London: Blackwell.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Social Affordance : "properties of an environment that act as socio-contextual facilitators relevant for the learner's social interactions" Kreijins, Kirschner and Jochems, 2002
Social Presence : "the degree of salience of the other person in the interaction and the consequent salience of the interpersonal relationships. (...) Social presence is required to enhance and foster online social interaction, which is the major foundation of social learning" Williams and Christie
The archetypal social affordance device is the coffee machine.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE I just finished "City of Bits" (William Mitchell), the reading notes are here
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Bell's very first telephone messsage was : "Mrs Watson, come here, I want to see you".
-> Telephone created a new form of contact; it extended and redefined the sphere of interaction and inhabitation.
this site presents a tremendously wide bunch of stuff concerning place and space from different approaches. Conferences and journals are presented.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE "What exactly is the mode of existence of social relationships? ...The study of space offers an answer according to which he social relations of production have a social existence to the extent that they have a spatial existence; they project themselves into a space, becoming inscribed there, and in the process producing that space itself. Failing this, these relations would remain in the realm of pure abstraction - that is to say, in the realm of representations and hence of ideology: the realm of verbalism, verbiage and empty words" (Lefebvre, 1991:129).
"It is a question of discovering or developing a unity of theory between fields which are given as being separate,...Which fields?...First, the physical, nature, the cosmos, - then the mental (which is comprised of logic and formal abstraction), - finally the social. In other words, this search concerns logico-epistemological space - the space of social practices, - that in which sensible phenomena are situated in, not excluding the imaginary, projects and projections, symbols, utopias" (Lefebvre 1974:19).
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE Mizuko Ito seems to be a very smart researcher working in the field of cultural anthropology (specialized in studies of media technology use).
Her work deals with how people use the Internet, computer games, and other digital media, particularly in special interest and fan groups that are highly targeted and personalized.
Her studies on Japanese Technoculture and Mobile Phones is particulary worthy regarding my interests.
Bookmarklets | MOVABLE TYPE colloquia is a company that organizes workshop about architecture and behaviour.
Human beings shape their environment according to relations that they establish with nature and fellow human beings. Colloquia promotes reflections and initiatives that value cultural and historic diversity of humans in search for a manifold environment. Colloquia - established at the Scientific Park of the Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne - organizes colloquiums and exhibits of a scientific character with a human dimension.