Tuesday, January 16, 2007
http://farago.blogspot.com/2005/04/chi-reactions-or-how-i-used-dewey-to.html
I actually inspired part of this posting
CHI reactions or how I used Dewey to review papers
It's an odd kind of meeting when person you meet for the first time (or so you think) suddenly tells you - hi, i know you, you wrote my rejection letter... Quite honestly, I did not know where to hide just at that moment. This also made me rethink the process by which my workshop co-organizers and I reviewed papers for our Engaging the City workship at CHI 2005.
.....
the process of research or design must have four parts to it:
1. the indeterminate situation (a situation that is not fully understood, unknown or uncertain - for example "making friends is a difficult proccess and we actually don't quite know how people do it")
2. the formation of a problem for inquiry - that is, figuring out exactly what is the major question your research or design must answer. For example - considering the above "indeterminate situation" of making friends, the question could be - what are the major determinants of whether someone is considered a friend or not?
3. the distinctions and relations that may be discovered in a directed transofmration of the situation - this means, you must understand what is already known about the topic of your interest and the question you are asking and then perform investigations to add to that knowledge in a systematic fashion so that you may answer the original question you posed
4. the unified outcome that is produced - that is, once the answer to the quesiton you posed is found, you must incorporate that with existing information and add it to the larger framework of the situation itself (in this case "how do people make friends") in an effort to move towards a complete understanding of the situation (making the situation determinant).
So, any research paper must start out with the description of an indeterminate situation (along with an argument of exactly why it is indeterminate). It then must ask the "question", that is "formulate a problem of inquiry", setting a clear thesis for the work. Then it must balance both the existing theoretical framework it uses to investigate/find answers and the advances that are made to add to the existing knowledge in an effort to answer the question. It must finish with showing how the new knowledge is incorporated into the coherent whole of the original situation and contributes towards making the situation determinant.
During writing - this is a strict road map and the hardest portion, I find, is clearly formulating the question.
I actually inspired part of this posting
CHI reactions or how I used Dewey to review papers
It's an odd kind of meeting when person you meet for the first time (or so you think) suddenly tells you - hi, i know you, you wrote my rejection letter... Quite honestly, I did not know where to hide just at that moment. This also made me rethink the process by which my workshop co-organizers and I reviewed papers for our Engaging the City workship at CHI 2005.
.....
the process of research or design must have four parts to it:
1. the indeterminate situation (a situation that is not fully understood, unknown or uncertain - for example "making friends is a difficult proccess and we actually don't quite know how people do it")
2. the formation of a problem for inquiry - that is, figuring out exactly what is the major question your research or design must answer. For example - considering the above "indeterminate situation" of making friends, the question could be - what are the major determinants of whether someone is considered a friend or not?
3. the distinctions and relations that may be discovered in a directed transofmration of the situation - this means, you must understand what is already known about the topic of your interest and the question you are asking and then perform investigations to add to that knowledge in a systematic fashion so that you may answer the original question you posed
4. the unified outcome that is produced - that is, once the answer to the quesiton you posed is found, you must incorporate that with existing information and add it to the larger framework of the situation itself (in this case "how do people make friends") in an effort to move towards a complete understanding of the situation (making the situation determinant).
So, any research paper must start out with the description of an indeterminate situation (along with an argument of exactly why it is indeterminate). It then must ask the "question", that is "formulate a problem of inquiry", setting a clear thesis for the work. Then it must balance both the existing theoretical framework it uses to investigate/find answers and the advances that are made to add to the existing knowledge in an effort to answer the question. It must finish with showing how the new knowledge is incorporated into the coherent whole of the original situation and contributes towards making the situation determinant.
During writing - this is a strict road map and the hardest portion, I find, is clearly formulating the question.
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