Evaluative Ethnography and Systems Design: can it also be used to assess presence

Since the late 1980s an increasing level of interest has been shown in ethnographic approaches, derived from sociology and social anthropology, as promising means to provide some assistance in the complex and delicate problem of systems design. Such methods, a “turn to the social” within system design, are central to attempts to develop a new perspective upon the design of technology. Ethnographic methods, with their emphasis on the “real world” character of settings, are seen by many as the means for thoroughly contextualized enquiry which can overcome some of the problems of systems designed on the basis of abstract models.