Bonnie Nardi & Activity Theory, Situated Cognition and Distributed Cognition

She argues that Activity Theory is most comprehensive and useful for studying learning in contexts.

Do we agree or not? Why?

Jarrod Bell, Vanessa Case, Chantal Drolet, Sophie Rosso

       Nardi’s Human-Computer Interaction perspective provides insight into the differences between Situated Action Theory, Distributed Cognition and Activity Theory (AT) by explaining how educators can use technology for the benefit of the learner. We agree with Nardi that AT is the most comprehensive and best suited theory for studying people learning in contexts.

      In the Situated Action Theory, researchers consider the fluctuations of daily contexts and avoid the use of specific learning objectives because learning is seen as unintentional. These parameters present encumbrances when examining the learner in educational contexts. Indeed, investigators must record and manage minuscule fragments of interactions. Due to the improvisational and reactive targeting of the learner’s objectives within this framework, enquiries evade introspective artefacts, thus negating the student an active role in the analysis.

       Conversely, the Distributed Cognition approach facilitates detailed data collection and enables corrective actions through a co-operative, observable system; however, it fails to clearly differentiate the learner from the concepts studied. It views humans as abstract “channels”, blurring who is learning from what is being learned.

       In contrast, AT asserts that the learner is at the heart of the experience. Clearly defined activities take into account the learners’ motivations and decision-making abilities. The “learning is what you do” (Nardi, 1995) standpoint sharpens the researcher’s focus. It also allows the consideration of external dynamics (community, organization) while monitoring the learner’s control within those contexts. Furthermore, comparing learners is easier since researchers distinguish learners from the artefacts of learning contexts.

       In summary, Nardi’s AT selection enables a wide-ranging research of the interaction between the learner and technology while keeping the student at the centre of learning contexts. Furthermore, the AT approach provides manageable objectives, observable in a reasonable timeframe. For these reasons, AT is the most effective investigative approach for the study of human learning contexts.

References

Driscoll, M. (2005). Situated Cognition, Psychology of Learning for Instruction (pp. 153-182). Toronto: Pearson.

Hutchins, E. (2000). Distributed Cognition. Retrieved July 7, 2008, from IESBS Distributed

Cognition: http://eclectic.ss.uci.edu/~drwhite/Anthro179a/DistributedCognition.pdf

Nardi, B. (1998). Concepts of cognition and consciousness: four voices. Journal of Computer Documentation , 31-48.

Nardi, B. (1995). Studying context: A comparison of activity theory,situated action models, and distributed cogniton. In B. Nardi, Context and Consciousness: Activity Theory and Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 35-52). Cambridge: MIT Press.

Rogers, Y. (1997). A Brief Introduction to Distributed Cognition. Retrieved July 7, 2008, from http://www.slis.indiana.edu/faculty/yrogers/papers/dcog/dcog-brief-intro.pdf

Spasser, M. (1999). Informing information science: The case for activity theory. Journal of the American Society for Information Science , 1136-1138. Retrieved June 30, 2008 from http://dx.doi/10.1002/(SlCl)1097-4571(1999)50:12<1136AlD-ASl17>3.0.CO;2-0

Tolman, C. (1988). The basic vocabulary of Activity Theory. Activity Theory , 14-20. Retrieved June 30, 2008 from http://www.comnet.ca/~pballan/AT2.htm