1,721,107 research outputs found
Trajectories in geographical space out of communication in acquaintance space: An agent-based model of a textile industrial district
No full textThis article presents an agent-based model of an Italian textile district where thousands of small firms specialize in particular phases of fabrics production. It reconstructs the web of communication between firms as they arrange production chains. In turn, production chains result in road traffic between the geographical areas on which the district extends. The reconstructed traffic exhibits a pattern that has been observed, but not foreseen, by policy makers
From Men and machines to the Organizational Learning Curve
No full textOrganizational learning can be understood as the arousal of recurring patterns of interaction between the members of an organization. Thus, the slope of the learning curve ultimately depends on the structure of information flows between organizational units. In particular, in a production plant organizational learning corresponds to improving the routing and sequencing of semi-manufactured goods between units. This contribution explores the impact of routing problems and sequencing problems on the organizational learning curve by means of numerical simulations and a stylized mathematical model
Emergent Organizations
No full textThis chapter overviews existing applications of agent-based modeling (ABMg) in organization science, pointing to possible cross-contaminations of these research fields. The reviewed applications include the garbage can model of organizational choice, the usage of cellular automata and of the NK model in order to investigate various problems of organizational interdependencies, and realistic agent-based models of agile productive plants. Possible future applications may include employing unsupervised neural networks in applied research on organizational routines, as well as employing sophisticated models of organizational evolution in order to understand such neglected features as punctuated equilibria and exaptation. Given the scope of the research agendas that ABMg can provide, it is quite surprising that this tool has been largely ignored by organization science hitherto. One possible explanation is that ABMg, which presents itself as a computational technique, inadvertently conceives its very nature of a tool for the exploration of novel research hypotheses. It is eventually perceived by non-practitioners as one more statistical technique for the validation of given hypotheses, and possibly a needlessly complex one
From Bounded Rationality to Collective Behavior
No full textSince the pioneering work of Herbert A. Simon, bounded rationality (BR) constitutes a viable alternative to utility maximization in settings characterized by uncertainty about the possible emergence of novel events, missing information, and limitations to human reasoning. Because of its realism, BR gained consensus in organization and management studies.
However, BR is a theory of individual decision-making. Substantial extensions are required in order to turn it into a tool to analyze collective decision processes.
Following an intuition by the late Simon himself, we submit that organizations channel information flows in ways that alleviate human BR. Thus, analysis and reconstruction of their structure as well as differential degrees and qualities of individual BR within organizations is key to extend this concept to collective decision-making.
In this special issue we collected contributions where instances of BR couple with interaction structures to yield collective behavior. Tools range from mathematical models to experimental settings to computational models, testifying the value of multiple approaches and perspectives
Playfulness, ideology and the technology of foolishness in the creation of a novel market niche for distributed control: The case of iPLON
Full text linkDistributed control is a technology and a design philosophy that, albeit superior to centralized control, cannot spread because it would require restructuring existing industries. It survives, however, in specific market niches. In this case-study we report on a small firm creating a novel market niche for distributed control. It is an engineering firm, where commitment to a fascinating technology generates the ability to turn serendipitous encounters into business opportunities. Because of deep beliefs motivating people to commit their lives in spite of substantial difficulties, we speak of a technological ideology. We submit that, in this case, a technological ideology is key to explain the ability to explore novel possibilities, or the technology of foolishness according to James March
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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