Design science and the accumulation of knowledge in the information systems discipline

Design science has emerged as an important research paradigm in the information systems (IS) discipline, and much has been written on how it should be conducted and evaluated (e.g., Hevner et al. [2004]; Walls et al. [1992]; Vaishnavi and Kuechler [2007]; Kuechler and Vaishnavi [2008]; Peffers et al. [2007]; Iivari [2010]; Pigneur [2011]). We contend that, as a socio-technical discipline, IS research must address the interaction between design and behavior. We begin with a background discussion of what we mean by IS research and the nature of the relationship between design and behavioral approaches to IS research. We discuss the nature of design, design science, and IT artifacts within information systems research and describe the importance of linking design and behavioral perspectives. We illustrate several key points using selected articles recently published in ACM Transactions on Management Information Systems [Schmidt-Rauch and Schwabe 2011; Lau et al. 2011]. We conclude with a vision of IS research in which the capabilities and affordances of IT artifacts are incorporated into behavioral studies; the results of behavioral studies are utilized in the development and evaluation of IT artifacts; and both behavioral and design perspectives are used to address the important problems of our constituent community.