A Framework for Understanding Decision Support Systems Evolution

Terms such as ‘adaptive’ and ‘evolutionary’ capture the organic nature of the development of a decision support system (DSS). However, they are rarely defined in DSS research and their meaning varies widely in the research literature. The aim of this paper is to contribute to decision support systems theory by clarifying the nature of the evolutionary process of a DSS. Using insight from the theory of evolution and prior DSS research, a framework for understanding DSS evolution is developed based on the aetiology, lineage and tempo of evolution. The aetiology of DSS evolution is discussed in terms of cognitive and environmental triggers, an important distinction for managing DSS projects. The lineage of DSS evolution is viewed as occurring within an application and between applications. In terms of the time pattern of evolution, DSS are considered capable of continuous, punctuated, and quantum evolution. The descriptive validity of the framework is demonstrated by using it to classify evolution in a number of published DSS

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