1. Rob Gleasure R.Gleasure@ucc.ie www.robgleasure.com
IS4446 Advanced Interaction Design Lecture 8: Designing the community 3 (boundaries)
Rob Gleasure

2. Today’s session Semester 2 Week 1: Introduction
Week 2: Designing the interface 1 (perception)
Week 3: Designing the interface 2 (affordances)
Week 4: Designing the interface 3 (aesthetics and colour)
Week 5: Designing the interface 4 (aesthetics and form)
Week 6: Designing the community 1 (trusting a platform)
Week 7: Designing the community 2 (trusting a group)
Week 8: Designing the community 3 (boundaries)
Week 9: Designing the practices 1 (tools as mediators)
Week 10: Designing the practices 2 (social mediators)
Week 11: Designing the practices 3 (socio-materiality)
Week 12: Revision

3. Universal design vs. design for specific groups and cultures
Some things transcend culture (see Bouba and Kiki below) but most things are built up by association
Image from wikipedia

4. Boundary objects
The concept of boundary objects originates in sociology, where it was originally used to describe things such as definitions and maps.
Boundary objects have two major qualities
Robustness, i.e. they maintain enough common meaning across different environments to maintain a common identity
Plasticity, i.e. they can adapt to different environments and perform different roles, as needed
These boundary objects may be ‘abstract’, e.g. a word that means partly different things to different people, or ‘concrete’, e.g. a piece of software used partly differently by different people
From Star and Griesemer (1989)

5. Boundary objects
Boundary objects are often considered ‘weakly structured’ in common use, only becoming ‘strongly structured’ when operationalised within specific social worlds
This means they have different meanings in different social worlds, while still allowing some common structure to maintain coherence
Effectively, boundary objects act as a form of translation
From Star and Griesemer (1989)

6. Boundary objects
The terms has become commonly used to explain how groups collaborate, despite the absence of any true consensus
People have different interest and goals (sometimes even the same person if multiple semi-overlapping social groups are involved)
People interpret according to different backgrounds and experiences
People don’t always want to work closely with other groups
People don’t need true consensus, they need enough consensus in the right places at the right times

7. Boundary objects
Boundary objects allow people from different social worlds to come together for specific tasks and purposes
This effectively links these different groups into a single functional community, provided the boundary object is adequate
Group A
Group D
Boundary object
Group M
Group H

8. Boundary objects Alternative visualisation Social world Social world

9. Identification of social worlds
Lots of ways to conceptualise a ‘social world’
A social group that maintains its core structure over time
An ‘activity system’ united under some common overarching motivation
The most important thing is that people, through interacting, have established accepted roles and norms that allow them to work together on an ongoing basis
Put differently, within-group consensus is already sufficient enough that it can be assumed
Social worlds can always be split further; we stop splitting social worlds when it stops being analytically useful

10. Norms and social worlds
One way to distinguish social worlds is by norms
Again, this is tricky, as the norms are partially dependent on roles, meaning like-for-like comparisons are rarely neat
Once more, the question is whether the norms jar so much that some form of translation is needed to create common ground
It often helps to think of these as local or shared cultures

11. Culture and social worlds
There are famously four major dimensions for culture (national, regional, organisational, or group-specific).
Power distance
To what extent are decisions made autocratically within a pronounced hierarchy vs. collaboratively among peers?
Uncertainty avoidance
To what extent are individuals willing to take risks and break rules based on potential gains?
Individualism vs. collectivism
To what extent are individuals able to act independently?
Masculinity vs. femininity
To what extent are individual behaviours driven by competition and assertiveness vs. nurturance and responsibility?
From Hofstede (1983)

12. Goals and social worlds
Another way to distinguish social worlds is by goals
When one group is interested in one set of outcomes and another group is interested in another, we can consider them separate (in need of a boundary object)
In practice, there will never be absolute overlap of goals between individuals, nor absolute non-overlap
The question is whether they are non-overlapping enough that they are in need of translation to work together

13. Selection of suitable boundary object type
Sometimes these boundaries objects take the form of repositories
These are collections of resources, stored and maintained in some ordered fashion
This allows people with different interests, purposes of use, and different levels of analysis to locate resources and drill down to the level of analysis they find useful, without having to negotiate how or why they want to use that resource
Common boundaries, different use goals
Examples include
The library
Wikipedia

14. Selection of suitable boundary object type
Sometimes these boundaries objects take the form of standardised forms/methods
These are collections of processes that allow common expectations for communication across different social worlds
This allows each social world to ignore the internal processes of other social worlds, while still knowing what to expect from them
Common boundaries, use goals, and perceived internal contents, different internal processing
Examples include
Laws
Validated forms for data input, XML exchanges, APIs, etc.

15. Selection of suitable boundary object type
Sometimes these boundaries objects take the form of coincident boundaries
These are collections of resources and processes, some subset of which are likely to interest each specific social world
This allows different social worlds to work together within a larger system, without needed to understand each individual element
Common boundaries and use goals, different perceived internal contents
Examples include
Organisations
Open source projects

16. Selection of suitable boundary object type
Sometimes these boundaries objects take the form of ideal types
These are incomplete descriptions of resources and processes, i.e. abstractions that need to be contextualised to be useful
This allows each social world to fill in the blanks as they see fit, while still providing some common ground for discussion and information sharing across social worlds
May be different in terms of boundaries, use goals, perceived internal contents, and internal processing
Examples include
Shared terms, visualisation tools
Logos/brands and flags

17. Selection of suitable boundary object type
The characterisation of a boundary object as one type is never exactly neat
More a question of emphasis
Image from

18. Design of robust qualities
The robust qualities tie the whole boundary object together
Makes it essential to find common ground across the social worlds
Has to be strong enough to give object an identity or else integrating the system into each social world won’t link them effectively
Helps to think in terms of people-process-technology
People: what human stuff is common/commonly desired, e.g. interests, norms, roles, groupings/institutions
Process: what behaviours are common/commonly desired, including formal and informal processes/practices
Technology: what stuff is common/commonly desired, including digital and physical objects

19. Design of plastic qualities
The plastic qualities are needed to allow each social world to accept the boundary object and continue existing
This means areas of benign disagreement must be found
Has to identify places where people can ignore differences without coming into too much conflict
Helps to think in terms of people-process-technology
People: what non-shared human stuff can/should be ignored by other social worlds
Process: what non-shared behaviours can/should be ignored by other social worlds
Technology: what non-shared stuff can/should be ignored by other social worlds

20. Boundary objects and trajectories
Some argue whether boundary objects are really designed at all, or whether they emerge and are shaped in use entirely by necessity
The real challenge is trying to design for benevolent ambiguity
Most designs need to have specific uses in mind if they are to avoid bloated and unintuitive tools
Designs that can achieve traction in multiple social worlds often become more effective boundary-spanners organically, as they become entangled in each world simultaneously (so entangling those worlds)
This raises problem of jostling for position..

21. Boundary objects and power
One of the main espoused benefits of boundary objects is their neutrality, i.e. their ability to balance multiple perspectives
Because boundary objects exist at the nexus of different social worlds, and because social groups are always struggling for power and authority, boundary objects are never power-neutral
Because the purpose of a boundary object is to be useful, this means there is always competition regarding for whom the boundary object should be most useful
This creates a constant tension as systems evolve over time, as resources and processes are reinforced by some and undermined by others

22. Summary Identification of suitable social worlds
Selection of suitable boundary object type
Quality of boundaries
Design of robust qualities
Design of plastic qualities

23. What do you think?
Imagine you are designing a system for managing electronic prescriptions
Who are the social worlds?
What is the boundary object type?
What qualities are robust?
What qualities are plastic?

24. What do you think?
Imagine you are designing a system for sharing requirements documentation, design sketches, and programming code within a software development company
Who are the social worlds?
What is the boundary object type?
What qualities are robust?
What qualities are plastic?

25. What do you think?
Imagine you are designing a reservation management system for a large hotel that can be used by all staff to coordinate various booking, payment, cleaning, catering, and leisure activities
Who are the social worlds?
What is the boundary object type?
What qualities are robust?
What qualities are plastic?

26. For forum discussion: Blackboard
Image from

27. Readings
Akkerman, S. F., & Bakker, A. (2011). Boundary crossing and boundary objects. Review of educational research, 81(2),
Hofstede, G. (1983). National cultures in four dimensions: A research-based theory of cultural differences among nations. International Studies of Management & Organization, 13(1-2),
Marcus, A., & Gould, E. W. (2000). Crosscurrents: cultural dimensions and global Web user-interface design. interactions, 7(4),
Ramachandran, V. S., & Hubbard, E. M. (2001). Synaesthesia--a window into perception, thought and language. Journal of consciousness studies, 8(12), 3-34.
Star, S. L., & Griesemer, J. R. (1989). Institutional ecology,translations' and boundary objects: Amateurs and professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, Social studies of science, 19(3),
Star, S. L. (2010). This is not a boundary object: Reflections on the origin of a concept. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 35(5),