I dont care what label ("transdisciplinarity" or "inter-disciplinarity" or "cross-disciplinary") - but this makes a lot of sense to me, Gail. If the question - and a basic accountability to a solution (whether one recognizes it as a "solution" or as "further questions/issues") drives research - it often takes us to many many places we did not anticipate going. This is what I meant by "integrity" of research. r
The transdisciplinarity approach to researching human behaviors lends itself well when technology is being used an enabler. I am finding it is necessary to use this approach to doing research to gain a better understanding of the different forces outside a specific discipline area that directly impacts human behaviors that can be assessed internal to a specific discipline. For instance, I am currently exploring how business organizations might use blogging as a tacit knowledge management support tool. My discipline area is human resource development. It is, though, necessary to take a look at the literature in any number of disciplines (e.g., philosophy, sociology, psychology, computer science) to gain insight as to how technology acts as an enabler in promoting human behaviors that are influenced by cultural practices. Hope this makes sense. :-) I am finding this approach to doing research is quite different as there is no established body of literature and the need to be knowledgeable and comfortable with spanning disciplines to seek out essential information to support hypotheses.
Gail
----------------------------------- Gail D. Taylor, Ed.M. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Human Resource Education Ph.D. Student Educational Psychology Teaching Assistant _______________________________________________ The Air-l-aoir.org@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
-- Radhika Gajjala Associate Professor School of Communication Studies Bowling Green State University Bowling Green, OH 43403 http://personal.bgsu.edu/~radhik