Identifier

etd-07102014-150352

Degree

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Information Systems and Decision Sciences

Document Type

Dissertation

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the topic of scholarship in the Information Systems (IS) discipline through a series of three papers. The papers, presented in Chapters 2, 3, and 4, each delve into a specific chronological period of IS scholarship which are delineated into the past, present, and future. Chapter 2 elucidates the IS discipline’s ‘past’ by categorizing the entire corpus of extant research in the Association of Information Systems Senior Scholars’ Basket of eight journals. Clusters derived from these mainstream journal publications represent a thematic identity of the IS discipline. After analyzing the corpus altogether, further analysis segments the corpus into shorter, 5-year periods to illuminate the historical evolution of the themes. Lastly, interpretations of the trends and a recommendation to curate an IS Body of Knowledge are discussed. Chapter 3 surveys business school deans and IS academics eliciting their ‘present’ social representations of the IS discipline. It then seeks the two groups’ feedback regarding their level of agreement with concerns attributed to the IS discipline as summarized in Ives and Adams (2012). Group responses are evaluated independently and are juxtaposed for between-group analysis. Then, additional concerns are gathered to ensure the full range of issues are represented. Network topic maps illustrate the findings, and interpretations are discussed. Group differences suggest that IS academics are more critical of the IS discipline than business school deans. In Chapter 4, an alternative research approach is offered for conducting ‘future’ scholarship efforts in the IS discipline. A framework that organizes discourse on the emergent crowdsourced research genre is constructed. Prior to building the framework, a crowdsourcing process model is developed to conceptualize how problems and outcomes interact with the crowdsourcing process. The internal process components include task, governance, people, and technology. Then, the crowdsourcing process model is applied to eight general research process phases beginning with the idea generation phase and concluding with the apply results phase. Implementation of the crowdsourced research framework expounds phase-specific implications as well as other ubiquitous implications of the research process. The findings are discussed, and future directions for the IS crowd are suggested.

Date

2014

Document Availability at the Time of Submission

Release the entire work immediately for access worldwide.

Committee Chair

Hirschheim, Rudy

DOI

10.31390/gradschool_dissertations.100

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