Stephen Downes

Knowledge, Learning, Community
I see D'Arcy Norman has taken to reading academic papers in much the same way I have: "lots of blah blah and lit review, but some interesting stuff buried in the blabbidyblab…" Here's the bit he found interesting: "Developing systems that offer perceived affordances is another way of encouraging participation in online communities, as is engaging an actor in a state of flow, whereby they will experience intemperance or even deference. However, this may mean that individuals will act out less positive desires, such as vengeance, and flame other community members that offend them." So - uh - if you let people do more things, they might do bad things?

Here's the core of the paper he refers to: "The framework accepts many of the principles of action put forward by Mantovani (1996b), including that actors construct interpretations of their environment based on their goals, which are referred to as situations. Mantovani's metaphor of users of virtual environments as actors seems appropriate for users of online communities. The ecological cognition framework indicates that these actors will experience a desire to carry out an action, such as solving a problem of another actor (level 1), interpret whether taking this action is consistent with their goals, plans, values, beliefs and interests (level 2) and use their abilities to carry out the action and perceive the environment they are part of (level 3)." I would like to believe that people's actions are that deliberately planned and carried out, but beyond the very broadest of interpretations, I know they are not. People should stop using such constructs.

Today: 1055 Total: 1058 [Direct link] [Share]

Image from the website


Stephen Downes Stephen Downes, Casselman, Canada
stephen@downes.ca

Copyright 2024
Last Updated: Mar 28, 2024 6:27 p.m.

Canadian Flag Creative Commons License.

Force:yes