Mindfulness Education in Information Systems Analysis and Design

Abstract

This research examines the definitions and interpretations of mindfulness in information systems (IS) literature and in Buddhism. It extends a previous qualitative case study (Wang, 2015) and further examines the students’ learning outcome in mindfulness and their interpretations of mindfulness in information systems development and end user experience. Students in a Systems Analysis and Design undergraduate course were asked to design websites for a contemplative community of practice. More than half of the IS students can interpret mindfulness using both the concepts in the existing IS literature and in Buddhism, even without the explicit exposure to the literature. For those students who have not related to both, they applied the IS literature to interpret mindfulness in systems development and applied Buddhism to interpret mindfulness in end user experience. Overall, the majority of the IS students who were exposed to mindfulness have recognized its importance in IS design and in end user experience and learned to express themselves with the terminologies of mindfulness, awareness, and contemplation.