Statement of Research Interests and Experience

My interests lie on the social science side of information science, and fall within the cluster of research approaches referred to as STS (SocioTechnical Studies, or Science and Technology Studies). My research has explored cross-disciplinary communication, the use of computer mediated communication in professional socialization, scientific collaboration, and the design of subject metadata for images. The unifying theme is the generation of knowledge: how knowledge grows within a discipline or a profession in relation to social context.

Methods used include social network analysis (but I am not conversant with current software), participant observation, interviews, and questionnaires. I do both qualitative and quantitative research, and particularly enjoy combining techniques to provide both broad and thick descriptions of phenomena.

My work has been cited in a variety of disciplines: information science, computer mediated communication, science studies, information systems, business/management, human-computer interaction, computer science, higher education, and sociotechnical studies.

My professional work has been primarily in the areas of thesaurus design and searching commercial databases.

Possible PhD Thesis Topic Areas

• Any sociotechnical or informatics research
• Design science (social studies of the design process)
• User studies
• Technology diffusion or adoption
• Requirements elicitation (as a social process)
• Boundary-spanning communication, boundary objects

Ten Representative Publications

• Weedman, J. (2008). Client as designer in collaborative projects: What does design theory tell us? In Vaishnavi, V., and Baskerville, R. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 3rd Annual Design Science Research in Information Systems and Technology.
• Weedman, J. (forthcoming). Design Science in the Information Sciences. In Bates, M. J., Maack, M. N., & Drake, M. (Eds.) Encyclopedia of Library and Information Sciences. New York: Taylor and Francis/Dekker Encyclopedias.
• Weedman, J. (2008). Information retrieval: Designing, querying, and evaluating information systems. In Haycock, K. and Sheldon, B. (Eds.) The Portable MLIS. Westport, CN: Libraries Unlimited.
• Weedman, J. (2005). Designers, clients, and knowledge production. D-Lib 11, Special section: Khoo, M. & Ribes, D. (Eds.). Studying digital library users in the wild.
• Weedman, J. (2004). Image vocabularies: Design as professional practice. In Breitenstein, M. (Ed.). Proceedings 15th Workshop of the American Society for Information Science and Technology Special Interest Group in Classification Research, Providence, Rhode Island.
• Weedman, J. (2002). Thinking with images: An exploration into information retrieval and knowledge generation. Information, Connections, & Community, Proceedings of the annual conference of the American Society for Information Science, Philadelphia, PA.
• Weedman, J. (1999). Conversation and Community: Using Electronic Conferences to Create Intellectual Proximity. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 50, 907-928.
• Weedman, J. (1998). The Structure of Incentive: Design and Client Roles in Application-Oriented Research. Science, Technology, and Human Values The Journal of the Society for the Social Study of Science, 23, 315-345.
• Weedman, J. (1993). On the “isolation” of humanist scholars: A report of an invisible college. Communication Research, 20, 749-776.
• Weedman, J. (1991). Task and non-task functions of a computer mediated conference used in professional education: A measure of flexibility. International Journal for Man-Machine Studies, 34, 257-267.

Professional Memberships and Related Matters

I’m a member of several professional organizations, including the American Society for Information Science and Technology, the International Society for Knowledge Organization, and 4S (the Society for Social Studies of Science). I have served as a referee for various journals and conferences, and contributed to various committees.