Information Systems Research: Reference Disciplines and Theoretical Contributions

The role of theory and research methodology in information systems (IS) research is deemed essential to its progress and eventual acceptance as a legitimate discipline. Despite IS disposition for practitioner-related issues, researchers have proposed that in addition to drawing upon reference disciplines IS should develop its own theories. This paper reports preliminary results of an investigation of published research between 1995 and 2004 to examine how IS discipline has utilized theories from the reference disciplines and used research methodologies. The findings indicate that IS has primarily focused upon studying the impact of IT upon organizational consequences. The adoption of IS has been a widely studied phenomenon. Further, the findings suggest the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), Task-Technology Fit (TTF) and the Resource Based Theory (RBT) have been the most commonly utilized theory bases. The paper also discusses how IS has pursued a number of evolving phenomenon and in the process has expanded the theoretical frameworks of the reference disciplines.