Supporting Emerging Disciplines with e-Communities: Needs and Benefits

Abstract

Background Science has developed from a solitary pursuit into a team-based collaborative activity and, more recently, into a multidisciplinary research enterprise. The increasingly collaborative character of science, mandated by complex research questions and problems that require many competencies, requires that researchers lower the barriers to the creation of collaborative networks of experts, such as communities of practice (CoPs).Objectives The aim was to assess the information needs of prospective members of a CoP in an emerging field, dental informatics, and to evaluate their expectations of an e-community in order to design a suitable electronic infrastructure.Methods A Web-based survey instrument was designed and administered to 2768 members of the target audience. Benefit expectations were analyzed for their relationship to (1) the respondents’ willingness to participate in the CoP and (2) their involvement in funded research. Two raters coded the respondents’ answers regarding expected benefits using a 14-category coding scheme (Kappa = 0.834).Results The 256 respondents (11.1% response rate) preferred electronic resources over traditional print material to satisfy their information needs. The most frequently expected benefits from participation in the CoP were general information (85% of respondents), peer networking (31.1%), and identification of potential collaborators and/or research opportunities (23.2%).Conclusions The competitive social-information environment in which CoPs are embedded presents both threats to sustainability and opportunities for greater integration and impact. CoP planners seeking to support the development of emerging biomedical science disciplines should blend information resources, social search and filtering, and visibility mechanisms to provide a portfolio of social and information benefits. Assessing benefit expectations and alternatives provides useful information for CoP planners seeking to prioritize community infrastructure development and encourage participation.

Clinicians’ Expectations of Web 2.0 as a Mechanism for Knowledge Transfer of Stroke Best Practices

“…This is important in the current health care system in Quebec where resources dedicated to training are scarce and time availability for integrating new knowledge is limited. As observed by Spallek [36], up-to-date and timely information are foundational elements of an emergent community of practice. The use of a Web 2.0 platform to obtain information in a timely fashion seems especially important to professionals working in remote areas despite their access to a large network of colleagues.…”

Knowledge sharing using codification and collaboration technologies to improve health care: lessons from the public sector

“…Active management appears to be a key component to sustaining CoPs and ICT tool utilization (Spallek et al, 2008). At minimum the two approaches are strongly correlated, based on feedback provided by users of the NRC website and CoP activity attendees.…”

“…Collaboration, on the other hand, is described as an informal approach whereby knowledge is socially identified, shared, and consumed (Hall, 2006). The KM literature possesses several examples of real-world practices that utilize both methods to appropriately manage knowledge within or between organizations (Ciabuschi, 2005;Tan et al, 2006;Spallek et al, 2008). While the NRC case study presents another example of formal codification and informal collaboration techniques, the study also describes informal codification and formal collaboration techniques that advance how codification and collaboration can be used to enrich the practice of KM and enhance its impact on organizations, government, and society.…”

“…Recent research (Spallek et al, 2008), however, suggests that a better approach may be to combine methods. Spallek and colleagues found that members of an online dental informatics community utilized ICT tools to augment regular phone and in-person CoP activities.…”

Using Natural Language Processing to Enable In-depth Analysis of Clinical Messages Posted to an Internet Mailing List: A Feasibility Study

“…Even though passive, lurkers can still learn from core and active members who serve as information providers [10,11,30]. In fact, peripheral participation may be essential for the viability of a CoP [31] because lurking, even with its negative connotations, is “a form of participation that is both acceptable and beneficial to online groups” (p. 6, [29]).…”