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Department of Social Science Informatics
The department of Social Science Informatics (SWI) has a long standing experience and reputation (see IEEE) in research in information technology in its social environment, carried out in a large number of individual, national and European research-projects. The Department currently employs about 25 people.
Permanent staff: The permanent staff currently 1997) consists of: Bob J. Wielinga, (head of the department, full professor), Peter van den Besselaar (associate professor), Joost Breuker (associate professor), Robert de Hoog (associate professor), Guus Schreiber (associate professor), Bert Bredeweg (assistant professor), Wouter Jansweijer (assistant professor), Carolien Metselaar (assistant professor), Maarten van Someren (assistant professor)
Teaching: The department offers a MSc program in Social Science Informatics. Students can specialize in applied AI and knowledge engineering, in complex socio-technical systems, and in social aspects of information technology. The latter variant is strongly oriented towards the idea of ëhuman centred systemsí The department is involved in the Dutch Graduate School in Information Systems and Knowledge Engineering (SIKS), which offers various PhD programs.
Research: Three areas of research are pursued:
Foundations of knowledge engineering
SWI focuses within AI research on knowledge-level modeling, knowledge sharing and re-use, knowledge management, knowledge acquisition tools, machine learning, qualitative reasoning, the architecture of knowledge based systems.
Social aspects of information technology
The impact of information technology on organizations and society at large, covering topics like privacy, human-centred systems design, technology, employment and the workplace, socio-technic design methods.
Intelligent Tutoring Systems
The theory and design of intelligent systems in an educational environment. This includes learner modelling, authoring systems for simulation programs, intelligent help systems.
A selection of former (1-5) and current (6-8) large research projects
1. KADS-I/KADS-II: Both funded by the EC under ESPRIT. Development of a comprehensive methodology for building knowledge based systems.
2. KACTUS: Funded by the EU under ESPRIT. Investigation and development of re-usable ontologies.
3. GAMES-II: A project under the AIM project, focused on developing knowledge based systems in medicine
4. XPCE: University funded research and development for a language independent generic user-interface, used as an extension to LISP and Prolog. Commercially marketed by ISL PCE is the underlying Prolog developed by the department.
5. COMIC: A Esprit Basic Research Project in Computer Supported Cooperative Work, focusing on fundamental aspects of large scale CSCW applications.
6. HUMAN: An ESPRIT funded project concerned with knowledge based support for Human Resources Management. CommonKADS is used and validated in this project.
7. GRASP: System for the support of the retrieval of stolen property across Europe.
8. SERVIVE: A Telematics funded project building an authoring environment for developing instructional simulations. SWI work is mainly directed towards the authoring methodology.
Smaller research projects are, among others, focusing on ëConsequences of the introduction of knowledge based systems for organization and quality of working lifeí; ëcosts and benefits of Knowledge based systems in organizationsí, ëCSCW and virtual communitiesí; ëInformation technology and employmentí; ënon-linear and self-organizing complex systemsí, ëMachine learningí, ëMultimediaí, ëQualitative reasoningí.
A selection of representative publications
Besselaar, Peter van den, Andrew Clement & Pertti J[[perthousand]]rvinen (eds.) Information system, work and organization design. Amsterdam: North Holland Publishing Company, 1991.
Heijst, G.J. Van, A. Th. Schreiber and B. J. Wielinga. Using explicit ontologies for KBS development. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, (Forthcoming)
Leydesdorff, Loet & Peter van den Besselaar (eds.), Evolutionary economics and chaos theory: New directions in technology studies. London: Frances Pinter Publishers, 1994. xiii + 215 pp.
Leydesdorff, Loet, Susan Cozzens & Peter van den Besselaar, Tracking areas of strategic importance by using scientometric journal mappings. Research policy 23 (1994) pp 217-229.
Carolien Metselaar, Matching knowledge based systems with organizations through user-producer interaction, in: G.E. Bradley, H.W. Hendrick (eds)., Human Factors in Organizational Design and Management-IV, 1994, North- Holland, Amsterdam, p.443-448.
Mowhowittz, Abbe, On the market value of information commodities. Part 1, 2, 3. In The Journal of the American Society for Information Science JASIS, 43 pp. 225-248
Mowshowitz, Abbe, The virtual organization. In The Information Society, 10 (1994) 4
Post, W., R. de Hoog, B. J. Wielinga and A. Th. Schreiber. Organizational Modeling in CommonKADS: the Emergency Medical Service. IEEE Expert, (forthcoming).
Schreiber, A. Th. and B. J. Wielinga. SWI: Making knowledge technology work. IEEE Expert, 11(2):74ñ76, April 1996.
Schreiber, A. Th. B. J. Wielinga, J. M. Akkermans, W. Van de Velde, and R. de Hoog. CommonKADS: A comprehensive methodology for KBS development. IEEE Expert, 9(6):28ñ37, December 1994.