Nereu Florencio "Ned" Kock is a

Brazilian-American Brazilian Americans ( pt, brasileiros americanos or ) are Americans who are of full or partial Brazilian ancestry. The Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimates the Brazilian American population to be 1,775,000, the largest of any Brazili ...

philosopher. He is a Texas A&M Regents Professor of Information Systems at Texas A&M International University.

Background

Kock holds a B.E.E. in Electrical Engineering from the Federal Technological University of Parana at

Curitiba Curitiba () is the capital and largest city in the state of Paraná in Brazil. The city's population was 1,948,626 , making it the eighth most populous city in Brazil and the largest in Brazil's South Region. The Curitiba Metropolitan area ...

, Brazil, a M.Sc. in

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

from the Institute of Aeronautical Technology, Brazil, and a Ph.D. in management with a concentration in

information systems An information system (IS) is a formal, sociotechnical, organizational system designed to collect, process, store, and distribute information. From a sociotechnical perspective, information systems are composed by four components: task, people ...

from the School of Management Studies,

University of Waikato , mottoeng = For The People , established = 1964; years ago , endowment = (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $263.6 million (31 December 2020) , chancellor = Sir Anand Satyanand, GNZM, QSO, KStJ , vice_chancellor = Neil Quigley , cit ...

, New Zealand.

Work

Kock is best known for employing biological evolution ideas to the understanding of human behavior toward technologies, particularly information technologies. He developed

media naturalness theory Media naturalness theory is also known as the psychobiological model. The theory was developed by Ned Kock and attempts to apply Darwinian evolutionary principles to suggest which types of computer-mediated communication will best fit innate huma ...

, an evolutionary communication media theory. Kock is the writer of a popular blog on the intersection of evolution, statistics, and health. He developed WarpPLS, a nonlinear variance-based structural equation modeling software tool. The underlying mathematics employed in WarpPLS builds on the method of path analysis, developed by the evolutionary biologist

Sewall Wright Sewall Green Wright FRS(For) Honorary FRSE (December 21, 1889March 3, 1988) was an American geneticist known for his influential work on evolutionary theory and also for his work on path analysis. He was a founder of population genetics alongsi ...

. WarpPLS has been used to study a variety of topics, including nursing education, password security risks, software testing, customer satisfaction, accounting education, and web-based homework. He has conducted research and written on the topic of academic plagiarism. His research and writings in this area have been discussed in

The Chronicle of Higher Education ''The Chronicle of Higher Education'' is a newspaper and website that presents news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty and student affairs professionals (staff members and administrators). A subscription is required to re ...

, and contributed to considerable debate on the topic within the

Association for Computing Machinery The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) is a US-based international learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 and is the world's largest scientific and educational computing society. The ACM is a non-profit professional member ...

, and to the establishment of an ethics committee within the

Association for Information Systems The Association for Information Systems (AIS) is an international, not-for-profit, professional association for scholars of information systems that was established in 1994. The association publishes journals, organizes conferences, and provides ...

. He was Founding Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of e-Collaboration from 2004 to 2017. Kock has also been a proponent of the use of

action research Action research is a philosophy and methodology of research generally applied in the social sciences. It seeks transformative change through the simultaneous process of taking action and doing research, which are linked together by critical refl ...

in the study of human behavior toward technologies, arguing that it can be used in investigations aimed at testing hypotheses in a

postpositivist Postpositivism or postempiricism is a metatheoretical stance that critiques and amends positivism and has impacted theories and practices across philosophy, social sciences, and various models of scientific inquiry. While positivists emphasiz ...

fashion. As a result of his action research investigations, he developed a method for systems analysis and business process redesign that places emphasis on the optimization of communication interactions in business processes.

Selected publications

*Kock, N., Avison, D., & Malaurent, J. (2017)
Positivist information systems action research: Methodological issues.
'' Journal of Management Information Systems'', 34(3), 754-767. *Kock, N., Jung, Y., & Syn, T. (2016)
Wikipedia and e-collaboration research: Opportunities and challenges.
'' International Journal of e-Collaboration'', 12(2), 1-8. *Kock, N. (2009)
Information systems theorizing based on evolutionary psychology: an interdisciplinary review and theory integration framework.
''

MIS Quarterly ''Management Information Systems Quarterly'', referred to as ''MIS Quarterly'', is an online-only quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal that covers research in management information systems and information technology. It was established in ...

'', 33(2), 395-418. *Kock, N. (Ed.). (2007).
Information systems action research: An applied view of emerging concepts and methods.
' New York, NY: Springer-Verlag. *Kock, N. (2006).
Systems analysis & design fundamentals: A business process redesign approach.
' Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. *Kock, N. (2005)
Media richness or media naturalness? The evolution of our biological communication apparatus and its influence on our behavior toward e-communication tools.
''

IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication ''IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication'' is a peer-reviewed journal publishing four times a year since 1957 by the IEEE Professional Communication Society. Readers include engineers, scientists, technical and professional writers, infor ...

'', 48(2), 117–130. *Kock, N. (2004)
The psychobiological model: Towards a new theory of computer-mediated communication based on Darwinian evolution.
'' Organization Science'''', 15(3), 327–348. *Kock, N., & Davison, R. (2003)
Dealing with plagiarism in the IS research community: A look at factors that drive plagiarism and ways to address them.
''

'', 27(4), 511–532. *Kock, N. (1999)
A case of academic plagiarism.
''

Communications of the ACM ''Communications of the ACM'' is the monthly journal of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). It was established in 1958, with Saul Rosen as its first managing editor. It is sent to all ACM members. Articles are intended for readers wi ...

'', 42(7), 96–104.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kock, Ned Texas A&M International University faculty American sociologists American philosophers Brazilian emigrants to the United States Brazilian philosophers People in educational technology Brazilian scientists Living people University of Waikato alumni Information systems researchers Year of birth missing (living people)

Background

Work

Selected publications

See also

References