The Informing Science Institute: The Informing System of a Transdiscipline

Introduction Academic research today is often conducted through the myopic lens of one discipline or another, using the approaches favored by a specific discipline, and with the results published in journals dedicated to and commonly only read by one discipline. There are many complex problems found in the real world, however, that cannot be solved without considering the problem from several viewpoints. The Informing Science Institute allows research to be published that considers multiple disciplinary viewpoints and approaches to discussing issues related to informing. Informing science is a philosophical research approach that encourages researchers to step out of their departmental research silos, collaborate, and learn from each other when researching systems that are designed to inform (Cohen, 2009a). The Informing Science Institute (ISI) is the organizing body founded to advance informing science research, collaboration, and mentorship. In the decade since its founding, the ISI developed a large academic membership and an active publishing platform. For example, since its inception, it has published approximately 1,000 articles by over 1,000 authors from over 500 universities all across the globe (See http://informingscience.org/iournals.php for listing of all journal articles.) In the present paper, the ISI is described as an applied instance of an informing system. Key characteristics of the system are as follows: * Interdisciplinary Community of Clients: Membership of the ISI includes researchers from information science, management information systems, instructional technology, education, communication, biology, cognitive sciences, and other disciplines, all collaborating in studying problems related to informing. * Diverse Informing Channels: The institute provides several channels of communication to its clients, including conferences, books, outreach activities, and 8 peer-reviewed scientific research journals that allow researchers to obtain peer review and publishing of their articles at no charge. * Global Community of Informers: The institute's publications boast an international group of contributors, guided by a variety of epistemologies, and facilitated by the international flavor of its conferences. We begin by considering the definition of an informing system. Then we describe how the elements of the ISI fit into this definition. The clients of the ISI are described, followed by a description of the informing channels the ISI employs, such as journals, books, and conferences. We conclude with an examination of some of the challenges and opportunities that face the ISI in the future. The Definition of an Informing System Cohen (2009a) specifies that the informing science framework has three components that must be present in an Informing System: the informing environment, the delivery system, and the task-completion system: * Informing Environment. The informing environment is analogous to the sender and encoder in the Shannon and Weaver (1949) communication model. Unlike the communication model, the informing science framework considers the informing environment at three levels of abstraction. These three levels are (a) the instance (using a system that is in place), (b) the creation of new instances of informing (to the organization or any of its components), and, at the highest level, (c) the creation of new designs for informing. * Delivery System. The delivery system refers to the use of information technologies (computing, communications, and so on) that support the implementation of the informing environment. Information technologies are not limited to computing. Data communication includes video and voice, and even personal contact when it is augmented through planned communication. * Task-Completion System. The driving force behind the creation of informing environments and delivery systems is that a task needs to be accomplished. …