Kenneth R. Fleischmann

Developing a meta-inventory of human values

Human values are increasingly being used as a concept in a wide range of fields including psychology, sociology, anthropology, science and technology studies, and information science. However, the use of this concept varies widely in these different fields, and several different instruments have been developed separately to measure values. This paper reviews research to date on values in all of these fields to develop a definition of values, and then reviews 12 value inventories to create a meta-inventory.

Boundary Objects with Agency: A Method for Studying the Design–Use Interface

The design and use of information technologies are not as easily separated as they may seem. Designers have much at stake in the use of their software, while users are greatly influenced by the design of the software that they use. In this article, I explore the complex relationships built up between the designers and users of human anatomy simulations, including processes of cooperation and conflict. I develop and apply a three-step process for studying the design and use of a software product in its social context. First, it is important to focus on the social worlds of designers and users that influence the development of the technology. Next, the emphasis shifts to the technology itself, which can be viewed as a boundary object emerging from the intersection of the contributing social worlds. Finally, the technology exhibits agency by reshaping the relationships and interactions among the contributing social worlds.

A covenant with transparency: opening the black box of models

One important ethical aspect of the use of models for decision making is the relative power of the various actors involved in decision support: the modelers, the clients, the users, and those affected by the model. Each has a different stake in the design of decision support models, and the outcome of modeling depends on both the technical attributes of the model and the relationships among the relevant actors. Increasing the transparency of the model can significantly improve these relationships. Here, we explore the importance of transparency in the design and use of decision support models.

Ensuring transparency in computational modeling

Computational models are of great s Cien tifiC and societal importance because they are used every day in a wide variety of products and policies. However, computational models are not pure abstractions, but rather they are tools constructed and used by humans. As such, computational models are only as good as their inputs and assumptions, including the values of those who build and use them. The role of ethics and values in the process of computational modeling can have farreaching consequences, but this is still a significantly understudied topic in need of further research. This article focuses on one particular value, transparency, documenting both why models should and how models can be transparent. Transparency is the capacity of a model to be clearly understood by all stakeholders, especially users of the model. Transparent models require that modelers are aware of the assumptions built into their models, and that they clearly communicate these assumptions to users. It is important that computational modelers recognize the potential for and importance of building computational models to be transparent. This article builds on an earlier article that makes the argument that computational models should be designed transparently to ensure parity and understanding among stakeholders, including modelers, clients, users, and those affected by the model. Data from an empirical study of computational modelers working in a corporate research laboratory is used to support this argument by demonstrating the importance of transparency from political, economic, and legal perspectives. This article also illustrates how transparency can be embedded in computational models throughout the stages of the modeling process.

The role of innovation and wealth in the net neutrality debate: A content analysis of human values in congressional and FCC hearings

Net neutrality is the focus of an important policy debate that is tied to technological innovation, economic development, and information access. We examine the role of human values in shaping the Net neutrality debate through a content analysis of testimonies from U.S. Senate and FCC hearings on Net neutrality. The analysis is based on a coding scheme that we developed based on a pilot study in which we used the Schwartz Value Inventory. We find that the policy debate surrounding Net neutrality revolves primarily around differences in the frequency of expression of the values of innovation and wealth, such that the proponents of Net neutrality more frequently invoke innovation, while the opponents of Net neutrality more frequently invoke wealth in their prepared testimonies. The paper provides a novel approach for examining the Net neutrality debate and sheds light on the connection between information policy and research on human values.

Digital Libraries with Embedded Values: Combining Insights from LIS and Science and Technology Studies.

In the digital age, libraries are increasingly being augmented or even replaced by information technology (IT), which is often accompanied by implicit assumptions of objectivity and neutrality, yet the field of science and technology studies (STS) has a long history of studying what values are embedded in IT and how they are embedded. This article seeks to unite the strengths of STS and LIS. First, the relevant literature on the values embedded in technologies, IT, physical libraries, and digital libraries is reviewed. Next, empirical and theoretical approaches for studying the values embedded in digital libraries are proposed. Finally, the boundary objects with agency framework is applied to digital libraries as a possible way to address the need for comparative empirical research about what values are embedded in digital libraries, how these values are embedded in digital libraries, and the implications of these embedded values.

Studying the values of hard-to-reach populations: content analysis of tweets by the 21st century homeless

This paper describes a content analysis of a corpus of 5,313 tweets from 32 individuals collected during a three-week period in March/April 2011. The corpus comprised two study groups: Group H -- Twitter users who self-identified as homeless or formerly homeless in their Twitter profiles, and Group NH -- a random, stratified sample of Twitter users who did not self-identify as homeless and who shared similar Twitter characteristics with those in Group H. The study uses the Meta-Inventory of Human Values for Informal Communication (MIHV-IC) to study value expression in tweets. Two rounds of inter-coder reliability testing demonstrated the challenges of reliably detecting human values in tweets. Analysis of categories with substantial inter-coder agreement indicated significant differences between the two groups for helpfulness and wealth. This approach provides a promising opportunity for detecting the values of hard-to-reach populations such as the 21st century homeless.

Automatic Text Analysis of Values in the Enron Email Dataset: Clustering a Social Network Using the Value Patterns of Actors

Widely discussed in the mass media, Web 2.0, or social software, has also drawn the attention of researchers, developing into a whole new research area. With Web 2.0s further development, corporations aim to adopt its technologies and transfer its benefits, such as enhanced collaboration and knowledge sharing, to their organizations. Whether any of these benefits also apply in an organizational context and whether there are further, still uncovered, benefits remains unclear. Furthermore, research in this area is still in its early stages, thus hampering progress towards qualitative and quantitative models that could provide answers. In order to encourage further progress in this area, we reviewed the existing research on corporate blogging and identified 24 articles that investigate the topic. Using the framework by Ives et al. [18], we categorized the articles for further analysis. By means of process theory, we build a conceptual model and identify the antecedents and consequences of internal corporate weblog usage. Our findings suggest that usage is driven by organizational culture, as well as by attitudes towards blogging. In addition, the benefits of weblog usage are centered on community benefits.

Charting Sociotechnical Dimensions of Values for Design Research

The relationship of values to technology is an important topic in the fields of information studies, human–computer interaction, media studies, and science and technology studies, but definitions and attributes of values differ within and among these fields. We suggest that researchers currently conflate multiple categories when they discuss values. Some of these categories are attributes of the source of values (i.e., people, systems, and hybrid assemblages), and others are attributes of the values themselves. This article disambiguates values in sociotechnical systems by providing a framework to describe where and how values are negotiated and enacted by people, institutions, and technology. The framework includes three dimensions that pertain to the source of values (agency, unit, and assemblage) and three dimensions that pertain to attributes of values (salience, intention, and enactment) to enable precision and comparison across this research trajectory. We illustrate each dimension with examples from the values and design literature.

REIMAGINING THE ROLE OF SCHOOL LIBRARIES IN STEM EDUCATION: CREATING HYBRID SPACES FOR EXPLORATION

In recent years, many technological interventions have surfaced, such as virtual worlds, games, and digital labs, that aspire to link young people’s interest in media technology and social networks to learning about science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) areas. Despite the tremendous interest surrounding young people and STEM education, the role of school libraries in these initiatives is rarely examined. In this article, we outline a sociocultural approach to explore how school library programs can play a critical role in STEM education and articulate the need for research that examines the contributions of school libraries as potential hybrid spaces for STEM learning. We propose that school library programs become active participants in STEM learning through the specific roles that school librarians currently play in schools, such as information specialist, instructional partner, and technology ally. We also highlight how these roles can be tailored toward helping young people develop STEM identities.