JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. Management Information Systems Research Center, University of Minnesota is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to MIS Quarterly. Introduction A significant amount of effort has been directed towards identifying the factors and processes contributing to information system success. In particular, user involvement in the systems development process and top management support towards computer-based information systems have received considerable research attention [14]. Other factors thought to influence system success are user cognitive style and individual differences [6,21,45], user expectations and attitudes [12,34], and technical system quality [2,24]. Investigators have also looked at the impact of power redistribution [25,29] and user motivation on system success. Examples of process research which highlight the importance of the relationship between user and designer throughout all phases of the system development process can be found in Zand and Sorenson [44] and Ginzberg [11]. The user's environment, in particular the organizational and decision context, has been discussed extensively in the literature [3,7,26]; yet there is a scarcity of empirical research on the subject, with the exception of Bean et al. [1], Abstract Robey and Zeller [30], and Halladay [19].A field study involving 124 organizations, and 378 DSS users, was conducted to ascertain the influence of the user's task environment on DSS success. Three groups were analyzed in the study: managers, financial and planning analysts (FPA's), and "others" who were predominantly management scientists or data processing analysts. The study focused on three factors discussed in the MIS literature as potential, but unsubstantiated contributors to DSS success: decision context (degree of problem structure), level of task interdependence (degree of interaction with others), and level of task constraints (degree of decision maker authority and autonomy). There was some evidence that the decision context and the level of task interdependence were moderately related to decision-making success for managers and others. There was very little support found to substantiate a relationship between the level of task constraints and DSS success for any group in the study. The results reaffirmed that the level of top management support, user training, and length of DSS use are important correlates of DSS success.Field research on the factors affecting successful DSS implementation is rare, however three DSS field studies are notable. Fuerst [10] conducted an empirical field study which indicated that accuracy and relevance of output, user training, and experience in the decision maker's role affected DSS use. ...