What’s in an Ecology? A Review of Artifact, Communicative, Device and Information Ecologies

Abstract

Decades of research have examined human-computer interaction with or across multiple (computational) artifacts as artifact ecologies, communicative ecologies, device ecologies, information ecologies, and other related conceptualisations. Although rich on observations and concepts, the works are largely self-contained and focused on using and developing concepts internally, with little ambitions toward synthesizing and strengthening what we know about these different theoretical concepts. In this paper we take stock of the literature on ecologies et al. in HCI and CSCW with the aim of identifying key positions, differences, similarities, and sub-concepts, as well as opportunities moving forward. From a reviewed corpus of 129 publications we consolidate 54 concepts into four influential positions and identify cross-cutting themes, conceptual gaps and challenges moving forward. In addition, we discuss issues related to the disconnected nature and theoretical quality of the concepts and how that impacts implicit theorising within our research community.