The contributions of systems science to the development of the decision support system subspecialties: an empirical investigation

Abstract

This is a comprehensive study that, by means of an empirical assessment of the decision support systems (DSS) literature over the past 23 years (1971–1993), systematically identifies the DSS reference disciplines and traces how concepts and findings by systems researchers have been picked up by DSS researchers to be applied, extended and refined in the development of DSS research subspecialties. Cluster analysis was applied to an author cocitation frequency matrix derived from a comprehensive database of the DSS literature to uncover 12 clusters consisting of six major areas of DSS research (foundations, group DSS, model management, user interfaces, implementation and multicriteria DSS) and six contributing disciplines (multiple-criteria, decision-making, cognitive science organization science, artificial intelligence, group decision-making and systems science). This study concludes that systems scientists have made important contributions to the development of foundational concepts, implementation, user interface, model management and group decision support systems. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.