Research In The Wild

The phrase "in-the-wild" is becoming popular again in the field of human-computer interaction (HCI), describing approaches to HCI research and accounts of user experience phenomena that differ from those derived from other lab-based methods. The phrase first came to the forefront 20-25 years ago when anthropologists Jean Lave (1988), Lucy Suchman (1987), and Ed Hutchins (1995) began writing about cognition being in-the-wild. Today, it is used more broadly to refer to research that seeks to understand new technology interventions in everyday living. A reason for its resurgence in contemporary HCI is an acknowledgment that so much technology is now embedded and used in our everyday lives. Researchers have begun following suit—decamping from their usability and living labs and moving into the wild; carrying out in-situ development and engagement, sampling experiences, and probing people in their homes and on the streets. The aim of this book is to examine what this new direction entails and what it means for HCI theory, practice, and design. The focus is on the insights, demands and concerns. But how does research in the wild differ from the other applied approaches in interaction design, such as contextual design, action research, or ethnography? What is added by labeling user research as being in-the-wild? One main difference is where the research starts and ends: unlike user-centered, and more specifically, ethnographic approaches which typically begin by observing existing practices and then suggesting general design implications or system requirements, in-the-wild approaches create and evaluate new technologies and experiences in situ(Rogers, 2012). Moreover, novel technologies are often developed to augment people, places, and settings, without necessarily designing them for specific user needs. There has also been a shift in design thinking. Instead of developing solutions that fit in with existing practices, researchers are experimenting with new technological possibilities that can change and even disrupt behavior. Opportunities are created, interventions installed, and different ways of behaving are encouraged. A key concern is how people react, change and integrate these in their everyday lives. This book outlines the emergence and development of research in the wild. It is structured around a framework for conceptualizing and bringing together the different strands. It covers approaches, methods, case studies, and outcomes. Finally, it notes that there is more in the wild research in HCI than usability and other kinds of user studies in HCI and what the implications of this are for the field.

This edited collection opens up new intellectual territories and articulates the ways in which academics are theorising and practicing new forms of research in ‘wild’ contexts. Many researchers are choosing to leave the familiarity of their laboratory-based settings in order to pursue in-situ studies ‘in the wild’ that can help them to better understand the implications of their work in real-world settings. This has naturally led to ethical, philosophical and practical reappraisals with regard to the taken for granted lab-based modus operandi of scientific, cultural and design-based ways of working. This evolving movement has led to a series of critical debates opening up around the nature of research in the wild, but up until now these debates have not been drawn together in a coherent way that could be useful in an academic context. The book brings together applied, methodological and theoretical perspectives relating to this subject area, and provides a platform and a source of reference material for researchers, students and academics to base their work on. Cutting across multiple disciplines relating to philosophy, sociology, ethnography, design, human–computer interaction, science, history and critical theory, this timely collection appeals to a broad range of academics in varying fields of research.

Edwin Hutchins combines his background as an anthropologist and an open ocean racing sailor and navigator in this account of how anthropological methods can be combined with cognitive theory to produce a new reading of cognitive science. His theoretical insights are grounded in an extended analysis of ship navigation—its computational basis, its historical roots, its social organization, and the details of its implementation in actual practice aboard large ships. The result is an unusual interdisciplinary approach to cognition in culturally constituted activities outside the laboratory—"in the wild." Hutchins examines a set of phenomena that have fallen in the cracks between the established disciplines of psychology and anthropology, bringing to light a new set of relationships between culture and cognition. The standard view is that culture affects the cognition of individuals. Hutchins argues instead that cultural activity systems have cognitive properties of their own that are different from the cognitive properties of the individuals who participate in them. Each action for bringing a large naval vessel into port, for example, is informed by culture: the navigation team can be seen as a cognitive and computational system. Introducing Navy life and work on the bridge, Hutchins makes a clear distinction between the cognitive properties of an individual and the cognitive properties of a system. In striking contrast to the usual laboratory tasks of research in cognitive science, he applies the principal metaphor of cognitive science—cognition as computation (adopting David Marr's paradigm)—to the navigation task. After comparing modern Western navigation with the method practiced in Micronesia, Hutchins explores the computational and cognitive properties of systems that are larger than an individual. He then turns to an analysis of learning or change in the organization of cognitive systems at several scales. Hutchins's conclusion illustrates the costs of ignoring the cultural nature of cognition, pointing to the ways in which contemporary cognitive science can be transformed by new meanings and interpretations. A Bradford Book

Behavioral Science in the Wild helps managers understand how best to incorporate key research findings to solve their own behavior change challenges in the real world – from lab to field. Behavioral Science in the Wild helps managers to implement research findings on behavioral change in their own workplace operations and to apply them to business or policy problems. As the second book in the Behaviourally Informed Organizations series, Behavioral Science in the Wild takes a step back to address the "why" and "how" behind the origins of behavioral insights, and how best to translate and scale behavioral science from lab-based research findings. Governments, for-profit enterprises, and welfare organizations have increasingly started relying on findings from the behavioral sciences to develop more accessible and user-friendly products, processes, and experiences for their end-users. While there is a burgeoning science that helps us to understand why people act and make the decisions that they do, and how their actions can be influenced, we still lack a precise science and strategic insights into how some key theoretical findings can be successfully translated, scaled, and applied in the field. Nina Mažar and Dilip Soman are joined by leading figures from both the academic and applied behavioral sciences to develop a nuanced framework for how managers can best translate results from pilot studies into their own organizations and behavior change challenges using behavioral science.

In Policing the Wild North-West: A Sociological Study of the Provincial Police in Alberta and Saskatchewan, 1905-32, the first comprehensive social history of provincial police in western Canada between 1905 and 1932, Zhiqiu Lin investigates the complex relationship between the role of policing, the political sphere, and social progress. This book attempts to analyze the effects on provincial police in Alberta and Saskatchewan of various social phenomena ranging from political radicals and vagrants to prohibition bootleggers and black market profiteers. These factors placed enormous demands on the development of policing and had a significant impact on three specific and interrelated areas: first, the professionalization of police organizations within society, as evidenced by changes in policing technology, varying political agendas, and, perhaps most importantly, within the police organizations themselves; second, the shifting of focus away from the "dangerous classes" and social agitators towards investigative procedures required for solving serious crime; and finally, the impact of policing on the rates of crime as influenced by the role of police officers as agents of social change and the value of social service in strengthening community and reducing the motivation towards criminal activity. The book concludes with an examination of the transition between federal and provincial responsibilities for policing in the two provinces, the reasons for the disbandment of the provincial police forces, and the broader issues of police development and the rationalization of policing in modern society.

Handbook of Sleep Research, Volume 30, provides a comprehensive review of the current status of the neuroscience of sleep research. It begins with an overview of the neural, hormonal and genetic mechanisms of sleep and wake regulation before outlining the various proposed functions of sleep and the role it plays in plasticity, and in learning and memory. Finally, the book discusses disorders of sleep and waking, covering both lifestyle factors that cause disrupted sleep and psychiatric and neurological conditions that contribute to disorders. Emphasizes a comparative and multidisciplinary approach to the topic of sleep Covers the neurobiology and physiology of sleep stages, mechanisms of waking, and dreaming Discusses in detail the proposed functions of sleep, from health and rest, to memory consolidation and synaptic plasticity Examines the current state of research in mammalian and non-mammalian species, ranging from primates to invertebrates

Report on activities in the Divisions of Cooperative Research, Cultural Methods Research, Population Ecology Research, and Population Regulation Research.