An Activity Theory Approach to Modeling Dispatch-Mediated Emergency Response

Authors

Roht Valecha, University of Texas at San AntonioFollow
Raghav Rao, University of Texas at San AntonioFollow
Shambhu Upadhyaya, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, State University of New York, Buffalo, New YorkFollow
Raj Sharman, State University of New York at BuffaloFollow

Abstract

Emergency response involves multiple local, state, and federal communities of responders. These communities are supported by emergency dispatch agencies that share digital traces of task-critical information. However, the communities of responders often comprise an informal network of people and lack structured mechanisms of information sharing. To standardize the exchange of task-critical information in communities of responders, we develop a conceptual modeling grammar. We base the grammar on an activity-theory perspective and ground it in an analysis of emergency dispatch incident reports. The paper contributes to research in dispatch-mediated emergency response literature by (1) developing a framework of elements and relationships to support critical information flow within emergency communities of responders, (2) developing a conceptual modeling grammar for modeling emergency tasks in dispatch-mediated emergency response, and (3) implementing a prototype system to demonstrate the utility of the conceptual modeling grammar.

Recommended Citation

Valecha, Roht; Rao, Raghav; Upadhyaya, Shambhu; and Sharman, Raj (2019) "An Activity Theory Approach to Modeling Dispatch-Mediated Emergency Response," Journal of the Association for Information Systems, 20(1), .
DOI: 10.17705/1jais.00528
Available at: https://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/vol20/iss1/2

DOI

10.17705/1jais.00528