Appropriation by unanticipated users: looking beyond design intent and expected use

Research in CSCW has demonstrated that people use technology in inventive ways, yet little work investigates the adoption and adaptation of collaborative technologies by unanticipated users. In this paper, we present a study investigating an unanticipated user group's appropriation of a leaning management system, CTools. This group of users, staff at a large research university, has adapted the system, which was designed to support student-content-faculty interactions at the University of Michigan. We present the User/Use Technology Appropriation Matrix (UTAM) as a way to frame our understanding of users and their system use. Based on findings from system log data and surveys, we show that staff use the system similarly to students and faculty, though they value the tools and work affordances differently in their varied work contexts. We discuss these findings, how UTAM can be used to frame these findings, and suggestions for future research.

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