A grounded theory of information sharing behavior in a personal learning space

This paper presents a grounded theory of information sharing behavior of the users of a personal learning space. A personal learning space is an environment consisted of weblog, ePortfolio, and social networking functionality. It is primarily used within education as a tool to enhance learning, but is also used as a knowledge management tool and to develop communities of practice. Our results identify privacy as a main concern for users of a personal learning space and illustrate challenges users face in ensuring privacy of their information and strategies they employ to achieve the desired level of privacy. We then identify factors that affect users' decisions regarding disclosure of their personal artifacts to various people and groups in a personal learning space. The three main themes as emerged in our study include current stage in the information life cycle, the nature of trust between the owner and the receiver of information, and the dynamics of the group or community wit...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: CSCW
• Authors: Maryam Najafian Razavi, Lee Iverson
• Keywords: CSCW 2006, Information Privacy, Personal Learning Spaces, Privacy, Social Sciences