Joachim Kimmerle

A systemic and cognitive view on collaborative knowledge building with wikis

Wikis provide new opportunities for learning and for collaborative knowledge building as well as for understanding these processes. This article presents a theoretical framework for describing how learning and collaborative knowledge building take place. In order to understand these processes, three aspects need to be considered: the social processes facilitated by a wiki, the cognitive processes of the users, and how both processes influence each other mutually. For this purpose, the model presented in this article borrows from the systemic approach of Luhmann as well as from Piaget’s theory of equilibration and combines these approaches. The model analyzes processes which take place in the social system of a wiki as well as in the cognitive systems of the users. The model also describes learning activities as processes of externalization and internalization. Individual learning happens through internal processes of assimilation and accommodation, whereas changes in a wiki are due to activities of external assimilation and accommodation which in turn lead to collaborative knowledge building. This article provides empirical examples for these equilibration activities by analyzing Wikipedia articles. Equilibration activities are described as being caused by subjectively perceived incongruities between an individuals’ knowledge and the information provided by a wiki. Incongruities of medium level cause cognitive conflicts which in turn activate the described processes of equilibration and facilitate individual learning and collaborative knowledge building.

The interplay between individual and collective knowledge: technologies for organisational learning and knowledge building

This article presents a framework model that defines knowledge building as a co-evolution of cognitive and social systems. Our model brings together Nonakas knowledge-creating theory and Luhmanns systems theory. It is demonstrated how collaborative knowledge building may occur – in an ideal situation – within an organisation, when people interact with each other using shared digital artefacts. For this purpose, three different technologies are introduced as examples: social-tagging systems, pattern-based task-management systems, and wikis. These examples have been chosen to demonstrate that knowledge building can occur with respect to both declarative and procedural knowledge. The differences and similarities between these technologies, as far as their potential for organisational knowledge building is concerned, are discussed in the light of the framework model.

Group awareness and self-presentation in computer-supported information exchange

A common challenge in many situations of computer-supported collaborative learning is increasing the willingness of those involved to share their knowledge with other group members. As a prototypical situation of computer-supported information exchange, a shared-database setting was chosen for the current study. This information-exchange situation represented a social dilemma: while the contribution of information to a shared database induced costs and provided no benefit for the individual, the entire group suffered when all members decided to withhold information. In order to alleviate the information-exchange dilemma, a group-awareness tool was employed. It was hypothesized that participants would use group awareness for self-presentational purposes. For the examination of this assumption, the personality variable ‘protective self-presentation’ (PSP) was measured. An interaction effect of group awareness and PSP was found: when an awareness tool provided information concerning the contribution behavior of each individual, this tool was used as a self-presentation opportunity. In order to understand this effect in more detail, single items of the PSP-scale were analyzed.

Information Exchange With Shared Databases as a Social Dilemma: The Effect of Metaknowledge, Bonus Systems, and Costs

When group members exchange information via shared databases people are often reluctant to contribute information they possess. This is explained by the fact that this kind of information exchange represents a social dilemma. This article applies critical concepts of dilemma theory to the interpretation of database information exchange as a social dilemma and tests their effects experimentally. A prestudy with the experimental task ensures that people perceive database information exchange as a social dilemma, and two experiments investigate three factors influencing this dilemma: (a) a person’s meta-knowledge about the importance of his information for the other group members, (b) a use-related bonus system that rewards contribution of important information, and (c) costs incurred by the contribution of important or less important information. As dependent variables people’s contribution behavior as well as their subjective perception of the dilemma structure are considered. The results show that metaknowledge enhances the quality of contributions, especially in combination with a use-related bonus system, whereas increased contribution costs influence the contribution behavior negatively.

An interactional perspective on group awareness: Alleviating the information-exchange dilemma (for everybody?)

In situations of computer-mediated communication and computer-supported cooperation, a central challenge lies in increasing the willingness of those involved to share their information with the other group members. In the experimental work presented here, a shared-database setting is selected as a prototypical situation of net-based information exchange and examined from a social-dilemma perspective: the individual who contributes information to a shared database must reckon with costs and no benefits. The most efficient strategy from the perspective of the individual is thus to withhold information. Previous research has shown that a group-awareness tool which provides information about the contribution behavior of group members influences peoples information-exchange behavior. In order to examine the psychological processes underlying these effects of group awareness in more detail, the present study adopts an interactional approach, according to which person-situation interaction is investigated. Certain personality traits (interpersonal trust, sensation seeking, and self-monitoring) were measured and several hypotheses tested regarding the reactions of individuals with high and low trait values to different types of awareness information. Results demonstrate that awareness tools providing information about highly cooperative group members encourage participants to trust one another and minimize the risk of being exploited. When an awareness tool additionally provides feedback about the contribution behavior of single individuals, it becomes an opportunity for self-presentation. In conclusion, an interactional approach which considers personality traits and situational factors in a net-based information-exchange situation provides new insights into both the influence processes of group awareness and the connection of these processes to specific personality traits with respect to contribution behavior.

Using wikis for organizational learning: functional and psycho‐social principles

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to aim to identify principles that make wikis an effective application when they are used within an organization. Those principles are supposed to make wikis a successful instrument for organizational learning.Design/methodology/approach – The article makes a distinction between functional and psycho‐social principles and emphasizes their impact on organizational learning.Findings – The functional principles (quick and easy editing; wikilinks; no hierarchical hypertext structure; revision and topicality; collaborative product; scalability and flexibility) may be regarded as the constitutive attributes of wikis. The psycho‐social principles (openness; self‐organization; autonomy; interest and personal relevance; diversity; serendipity effect) are not directly associated with wikis as a tool, but refer to the application context.Originality/value – The article explains the functional and psycho‐social principles in detail. This will help organizations and knowledge‐man...

Learning and Collective Knowledge Construction With Social Media: A Process-Oriented Perspective.

Social media are increasingly being used for educational purposes. The first part of this article briefly reviews literature that reports on educational applications of social media tools. The second part discusses theories that may provide a basis for analyzing the processes that are relevant for individual learning and collective knowledge construction. We argue that a systems-theoretical constructivist approach is appropriate to examine the processes of educational social media use, namely, self-organization, the internalization of information, the externalization of knowledge, and the interplay of externalization and internalization providing the basis of a co-evolution of cognitive and social systems. In the third part we present research findings that illustrate and support this systems-theoretical framework. Concluding, we discuss the implications for educational design and for future research on learning and collective knowledge construction with social media.

The collective knowledge of social tags: Direct and indirect influences on navigation, learning, and information processing

Tag clouds generated in social tagging systems can capture the collective knowledge of communities. Using as a basis spreading activation theories, information foraging theory, and the co-evolution model of cognitive and social systems, we present here a model for an extended information scent, which proposes that both collective and individual knowledge have a significant influence on link selection, incidental learning, and information processing. Two experimental studies tested the applicability of the model to a situation in which individual knowledge and collective knowledge were contradictory to each other. The results of the first experiment showed that a higher individual strength of association between a target in demand and a tag led to a higher probability of selecting corresponding links, combined with less thorough information processing for non-corresponding links. But users also adapted their navigation behavior to the collective knowledge (strength of associations of tags) of the community and showed incidental learning during navigation, which resulted in a change of their individual strength of associations. The second experiment confirmed these results and showed, in addition, that the effects also occurred for indirect associations. Altogether, the results show that the extended information scent is an appropriate and fertile model for describing the interplay of individual knowledge and the collective knowledge of social tags.

The social psychology of knowledge management

Purpose – This article seeks to address the social aspects of handling knowledge and information. For this purpose, it considers findings from social psychology and discusses their applicability in knowledge management research and practice.Design/methodology/approach – The article presents a selective but systematical review of recent social psychological literature that can be applied for knowledge management purposes.Findings – Two social psychological concepts that strongly influence knowledge processes in organizations are first introduced: social norms and social identity. Two types of social processes that are particularly relevant for knowledge management subsequently take center stage in this article: knowledge sharing and knowledge processing in organizations. The roles social norms and social identity play in knowledge sharing and knowledge processing are then assessed.Originality/value – Implications for knowledge management practice are considered: among other implications, it is discussed wh...

VISUALIZING CO-EVOLUTION OF INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE KNOWLEDGE

This paper describes how processes of knowledge building with wikis may be visualized, citing the user-generated online encyclopedia Wikipedia as an example. The underlying theoretical basis is a framework for collaborative knowledge building with wikis that describes knowledge building as a co-evolution of individual and collective knowledge. These co-evolutionary processes may be visualized graphically, applying methods from social network analysis, especially those methods that take dynamic changes into account. For this purpose, we have undertaken to analyse, on the one hand, the temporal development of a Wikipedia article and related articles that are linked to this core article. On the other hand, we analysed the temporal development of those users who worked on these articles. The resulting graphics show an analogous process, both with regard to the articles that refer to the core article and to the users involved. These results provide empirical support for the co-evolution model.