Seeking the Entanglement of Immersion and Emergence: Reflections from an Analysis of the State of IS Research on Virtual Worlds

Presenter Information

Michael Cahalane, Australian School of Business, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia.Follow
Joseph Feller, Accounting Finance and Information Systems, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.Follow
Patrick Finnegan, Australian School of Business, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia.Follow

Start Date

14-12-2012 12:00 AM

Description

This paper critically reviews the state of virtual world research within the Information Systems field; revealing areas of interest evident in research studies between 2007-2011, the methods employed to conduct such research, the theories/frameworks used to ground VW research, as well as reoccurring memes/concepts. We argue that virtual worlds are best interpreted as both an immersive and emergent co-creative process, ‘performed’ by users’ actions and interactions both with other users and with artifacts such as virtual goods. Nevertheless, our analysis reveals a near neglect of the substantive nature of digital materiality and of the emergent nature of virtual worlds. We conclude that this ‘human-centric’ stance has taken focus away from the unique nature of the virtual world artifact itself, and posit a research agenda that focuses on virtual world objects as well as the immersive and emergent activities of ‘world-builders’ as necessary to advance virtual world research.

Recommended Citation

Cahalane, Michael; Feller, Joseph; and Finnegan, Patrick, "Seeking the Entanglement of Immersion and Emergence: Reflections from an Analysis of the State of IS Research on Virtual Worlds" (2012). ICIS 2012 Proceedings. 12.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2012/proceedings/DigitalNetworks/12