Validating The Design Science Research Roadmap: Through The Lens Of “The Idealised Model For Theory Development”

Authors

Ahmad Alturki, Information Systems Discipline, Queensland University of Technology, 126 Margaret St., Brisbane, Queensland, AustraliaFollow
Guy G. Gable, Information Systems Discipline, Queensland University of Technology, 126 Margaret St., Brisbane, Queensland, AustraliaFollow
Wasana Bandara, Information Systems Discipline, Queensland University of Technology, 126 Margaret St., Brisbane, Queensland, AustraliaFollow
Shirley Gregor, School of Business and Information Management, Faculty of Economics and Commerce, The Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, AustraliaFollow

Abstract

Design Science Research (DSR) has emerged as an important approach in Information Systems (IS) research. However, DSR is still in its genesis and has yet to achieve consensus on even the fundamentals, such as what methodology / approach to use for DSR. While there has been much effort to establish DSR methodologies, a complete, holistic and validated approach for the conduct of DSR to guide IS researcher (especially novice researchers) is yet to be established. Alturki et al. (2011) present a DSR ‘Roadmap’, making the claim that it is a complete and comprehensive guide for conducting DSR. This paper aims to further assess this Roadmap, by positioning it against the ‘Idealized Model for Theory Development’ (IM4TD) (Fischer & Gregor, 2011). The IM4TD highlights the role of discovery and justification and forms of reasoning to progress in theory development. Fischer and Gregor (2011) have applied IM4TD’s hypothetico-deductive method to analyze DSR methodologies, which is adopted in this study to deductively validate the Alturki et al. (2011) Roadmap. The results suggest that the Roadmap adheres to the IM4TD, is reasonably complete, overcomes most shortcomings identified in other DSR methodologies and also highlights valuable refinements that should be considered within the IM4TD

Recommended Citation

Alturki, Ahmad; G. Gable, Guy; Bandara, Wasana; and Gregor, Shirley, "Validating The Design Science Research Roadmap: Through The Lens Of “The Idealised Model For Theory Development”" (2012). PACIS 2012 Proceedings. 2.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/pacis2012/2