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Information Technology as Disciplinary Technology: Being Critical in Interpretive Research on Information Systems

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Enacting Research Methods in Information Systems: Volume 1

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Abstract

The collection, analysis and interpretation of data are always conducted within some broader understanding of what constitutes legitimate inquiry and valid knowledge (Henwood and Pidgeon, 1993). It is the methodology adopted by a researcher that is the dominant influence on the research process and findings, rather than the methods employed, which remain data collection techniques (Putnam, 1983, Llewellyn, 1993). By discussing methodology, we reveal our choices of method and define the way these choices fit the research problem (Dobbert, 1990). However, choices in research methodology can not be unproblematically explained away simply by recourse to a researcher’s beliefs and philosophical assumptions (cf. Burrell and Morgan, 1979; Chua, 1986; Guba, 1990; Orlikowski and Baroudi, 1991).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Interdisciplinary Management Studies, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

    Bill Doolin

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  1. Bill Doolin
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  1. London School of Economics and Political Science, UK

    Leslie P. Willcocks

  2. Oxford University, UK

    Chris Sauer

  3. University of Missouri-St Louis, USA

    Mary C. Lacity

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Doolin, B. (2016). Information Technology as Disciplinary Technology: Being Critical in Interpretive Research on Information Systems. In: Willcocks, L.P., Sauer, C., Lacity, M.C. (eds) Enacting Research Methods in Information Systems: Volume 1. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29266-3_2

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