Purposes of Mapping

Mapping has not always been stressed in the literature on interdisciplinary research. It is thus useful to stress the many purposes served by a mapping exercise.

Mapping the relationships among phenomena serves several purposes:

· It helps to identify relevant phenomena (and thus disciplines)

· It clarifies which relationships among phenomena may be most important

· It allows the researchers to identify positive or negative ‘feedback loops’ that may encourage the system of relationships either toward stability or change. (Note that disciplinary researchers may not fully appreciate feedback loops that involve phenomena studied by other disciplines.)

· The researcher can then usefully ask which relationships have been studied by which disciplines.

· The researcher can also usefully identify relationships that have been under-studied or ignored, or analyzed using a limited set of theories or methods or data.

· Disciplines will often seem to be disagreeing because they are actually focusing on different relationships within a larger system. The mapping exercise can usefully identify such situations

· If the goal of the research is to suggest ways that the results emanating from the system might be changed, then the mapping exercise may serve to identify the best place(s) in the system to intervene in order to effect change. Achieving desired change in complex systems may require multiple interventions that work together toward desired changes but counteract negative side effects.

· It will often be the case that different relationships within the system are best studied with different theories and methods. In other cases, though, the mapping exercise can inform an effort to mathematically model the system as a whole.

· One key challenge of interdisciplinary analysis is to study the parts of the system while appreciating the whole (and that the whole may be more than and different from the sum of the parts). A map can be very useful in this respect.

Machiel Keestra’s article in Allen Repko, William H. Newell, and Rick Szostak, Case Studies in Interdisciplinary Research (2012) can be drawn on. There are also Paul A. Kirschner, Simon J. Buckingham-Shum and Chad S. Carr Visualizing Argumentation: Software Tools for Collaborative and Educational Sense-Making (Computer Supported Cooperative Work) (Springer, 2003) and Alexandra Okada, Simon J. Buckingham Shum and Tony Sherborne, Knowledge Cartography: Software Tools and Mapping Techniques (Advanced Information and Knowledge Processing) (Springer, 2010) on the general advantages of ‘mapping’ scientific arguments, and how to do this. The Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential (1994) emphasizes the importance of ‘maps’ if we are to solve the world’s problems (Vol. 1, 24; section TZ is devoted to mapping). The Mathews and Jones paper, "Using systems thinking to improve interdisciplinary learning outcomes," in Issues in Integrative Studies 2008 is very good, especially with respect to teaching.

Bergmann, Matthias , Thomas Jahn, Tobias Knobloch, Wolfgang Krohn, Christian Pohl, Engelbert Schramm (2012) Methods for Transdisciplinary Research: A Primer for Practice. Berlin: Campus have a section on theoretical framing. The second method here applies the idea of ‘boundary objects’: the research team needs to identify/create the set of objects, and the causal relationships among these, that will be studied. The third method simply asserts that the team needs to agree on a broad theoretical approach. Notably this might take the form of a diagram. Again it seems that the key is to identify key variables and relationships. Mapping is also encouraged when they discuss formulating a research question.

Kessel, F.S., Rosenfield, P. L., & Anderson, N. B. (Eds.). Interdisciplinary research: Case studies from health and social science (2nd ed.) New York: Oxford University Press, 2008 advocates heterarchy: an acceptance that phenomena are related in a non-dominant fashion so that it makes sense to study how each influences the other.