EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Rationality in Information Systems Support to Decision Making

David L. Olson ()
Additional contact information
David L. Olson: Texas A&M University

Information Systems Frontiers, 2001, vol. 3, issue 2, No 9, 239-248

Abstract: Abstract Management information systems serve business organizations by providing information for decision making. Various types of systems serve different types of decision contexts. The philosophic basis of information system support is discussed. The rational (or normative) philosophy is widely used, and appears in business theory in the form of agency theory and transaction cost analysis. While this approach has been valuable in some contexts, there are other contexts where the rational approach has limited in utility for real business decision making. Decision makers need to consider subjective factors to enable them to cope with the high levels of uncertainty, incomplete understanding, and imperfect data typical of dynamic open systems. There are alternative philosophies upon which to base decision-making that are appropriate for specific decision contexts. Churchman identified empirical, multi-perspective frameworks, dialectic, and cause-and-effect inquiring systems as alternatives to the rational (normative) system. A number of information system tools, such as decision support systems, expert systems, and group support systems can be supported by models based on philosophies other than rational models. A more empirically based philosophy, with decision-makers balancing hypothesis generation and observations of performance, is often more appropriate. The relationship between Churchman's inquiring systems and information system types are discussed.

Keywords: decision support systems; group support systems; expert systems; rational decision making (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2001
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1023/A:1011456626775 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:infosf:v:3:y:2001:i:2:d:10.1023_a:1011456626775

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/10796

DOI: 10.1023/A:1011456626775

Access Statistics for this article

Information Systems Frontiers is currently edited by Ram Ramesh and Raghav Rao

More articles in Information Systems Frontiers from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-20
Handle: RePEc:spr:infosf:v:3:y:2001:i:2:d:10.1023_a:1011456626775