ARGUING THE VALUE OF VIRTUAL WORLDS: PATTERNS OF DISCURSIVE SENSEMAKING OF AN INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY.

Author List: Berente, Nicholas; Hansen, Sean; Pike, Jacqueline C.; Bateman, Patrick J.;
MIS Quarterly, 2011, Volume 35, Issue 3, Page 685-709.
With the rapid pace of technological development, individuals are frequently challenged to make sense of equivocal innovative technology while being given limited information. Virtual worlds are a prime example of such an equivocal innovative technology, and this affords researchers an opportunity to study sensemaking and the construction of perspectives about the organizational value of virtual worlds. This study reports on an analysis of the written assessments of 59 business professionals who spent an extended period of time in Second Life, a popular virtual world, and discursively made sense of the organizational value of virtual worlds. Through a Toulminian analysis of the claims, grounds, and warrants used in the texts they generated, we identify 12 common patterns of sensemaking and indicate that themes of confirmation, open-ended rhetoric, demographics, and control are evident in the different types of claims that were addressed. Further, we assert that the Toulminian approach we employ is a useful methodology for the study of sensemaking and one that is not bound to any particular theoretical perspective.
Keywords: argument; organizational value; second Life; sensemaking; Toulmin
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List of Topics

#137 0.308 phase study analysis business early large types phases support provided development practice effectively genres associated different sensemaking including form technologies
#120 0.179 virtual world worlds co-creation flow users cognitive life settings environment place environments augmented second intention spatial interactivity ownership objects immersive
#138 0.142 use question opportunities particular identify information grammars researchers shown conceptual ontological given facilitate new little constraints dual answer post-adoption theory
#35 0.134 technology organizational information organizations organization new work perspective innovation processes used technological understanding technologies transformation consequences perspectives use administrative economic
#176 0.119 e-commerce value returns initiatives market study announcements stock event abnormal companies significant growth positive using methodology investments period time initiative
#54 0.101 approach conditions organizational actions emergence dynamics traditional theoretical emergent consequences developments case suggest make organization point outcomes recent trajectory claims