Science Communication

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Social Epistemology: Theory for the "Fourth Wave" of Knowledge

Transfer and Exchange Research
Nora Jacobson
Science Communication 2007; 29; 116
DOI: 10.1177/1075547007305166
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http://scx.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/29/1/116

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Social Epistemology
Theory for the Fourth Wave of
Knowledge Transfer and Exchange
Research

Science Communication
Volume 29 Number 1
September 2007 116-127
2007 Sage Publications
10.1177/1075547007305166
http://scx.sagepub.com
hosted at
http://online.sagepub.com

Nora Jacobson
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health

Knowledge transfer and exchange has become an increasingly important practice in the arena of publicly funded health and social research. Throughout
its history, investigators have used a variety of borrowed theories to explore and
explain the determinants, processes, and results of knowledge transfer. As the
context in which knowledge transfer takes place has changed, so too has the
theory used to explore and explain the process. This article reviews the role
of theory in knowledge transfer and exchange research and proposes a
novel source for potentially useful new theory in the current context: social
epistemology.
Keywords: knowledge transfer and exchange; knowledge utilization; knowledge translation; research utilization; social epistemology

nowledge transfer and exchange has become an increasingly important

practice in publicly funded health and social research, and is a topic of
study in and of itself. Throughout its history, investigators have used a variety of borrowed theories to explore and explain the determinants, processes,
and results of knowledge transfer. Theory has been influenced by knowledge
transfer practice and has, in turn, influenced the shape of subsequent knowledge transfer endeavors. As the context in which knowledge transfer takes
place has changed, so too has the theory used to explore and explain the
process. In this article, I review the role of theory in knowledge transfer and

Authors Note: This work was supported by a grant from the Deans Fund New Staff
Competition in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto. Please address all correspondence to Nora Jacobson, Health Systems Research and Consulting Unit, Centre for Addiction
and Mental Health, 33 Russell St., Toronto, ON M5S 2S1, Canada; phone: 416-535-8501, ext.
4229; fax: 416-979-4703; e-mail: nora_jacobson@camh.net.
116
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exchange research and propose a novel source for potentially useful new
theory: social epistemology.

A Brief Review of Theory in Knowledge

Transfer and Exchange Research
The past eighty years of research in knowledge transfer and exchange has
seen a plethora of theories, conceptual frameworks, and models offered to
explain and guide the knowledge transfer process. As Thomas Backer (1991)
argued in his review of the history of knowledge utilization research, the field
has moved through three distinct waves of emphasis. In the first wave, which
Backer dated from 1920 to 1960, the focus was on understanding how technology or practice innovations were accepted and adopted by individuals.
Substantively, most research dealt with innovations in agriculture and education. From the 1960s through the 1980s, the focus shifted to the dissemination
and utilization of innovations emerging from [federal government-funded]
research and demonstration activities [in the health and social sciences] and
innovation adoption by organizations as well as individuals (229). Backer
described the third wave, beginning in 1990, as one in which the understanding
of knowledge transfer became more sophisticated and government agencies
and other decision-making bodies were encouraged to rationalize their methods
for promoting the dissemination and use of research-based knowledge.
Although Backers review ended on the cusp of the third wave, he pointed to
several trends that suggested the defining features of a probable fourth wave:
increasing attention to quality assurance and accountability in publicly funded
agencies, greater awareness of ethics in research, the globalization of knowledge, and advances in theory and information technology. Together, Backer
argued, these trends might be expected to increase the importance and perceived value of knowledge and thus also raise the profile of knowledge utilization research.
Conceptually, the history recounted by Backer has been marked by several important changes. First, there has been an overall shift from so-called
push/pull models of knowledge transfer to more interactive models (Landry
et al. 2001), in which knowledge transfer is understood as a reciprocal
process of knowledge generation and application involving the traditional
producers (e.g., scientists) and traditional users of knowledge (e.g., practitioners and policy makers). Knowledge transfer was initially understood as
a unidirectional and logical flow of information from knowledge producers

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to knowledge users; however, in the 1970s, skepticism and frustration

regarding the difficulty of implementing research-based knowledge in the
social policy context led researchers to focus not on the use of information
but its nonuse (Wingens 1990). After a period of pessimism, in the wake of
the third wave emphasis on rationalized knowledge transfer and exchange,
researchers once again shifted to looking at use (Huberman 1994; Oh and
Rich 1996). The resulting models tended to be broader and more detailed
than earlier theories. For example, they focused more on process than product (Lomas 2000) and viewed knowledge transfer not as one-time, one-way
dissemination of information from knowledge producers to knowledge
users but as an ongoing relationship characterized by exchanges between
producers and users (Huberman 1990, 1994) in which the process of knowledge development influences the substance of the knowledge developed.
Second, there have been notable changes in the bodies of theory drawn
upon by researchers to account for knowledge transfer and exchange and to
guide knowledge transfer intervention and promotion strategies. During the
period of pessimism, the dominant theory in knowledge transfer was the two
communities theory, which drew on anthropological concepts to point to cultural differences between the knowledge production and knowledge application communities in explaining the lack of effective knowledge utilization
(Caplan 1979). Influenced by the assumption of a (bridgeable) culture gap,
intervention and promotion strategies tended to be based on various communication theories (Backer 1991; Boggs 1992). With the increasing focus on
knowledge transfer to health care and social service organizations noted by
Backer as characteristic of the second wave, organizational theorythat is,
theory about how organizations manage resources (including knowledge),
engage in decision making, and implement new practicesbecame another
important source of guidance for researchers (Dery 1986; Huberman 1990;
Langley 1989). In the arena of knowledge utilization by policymakers, the use
of theories drawn from political science and policy studies also became more
common (Elliott and Popay 2000; Hanney et al. 2003; Lester and Wilds 1990).
Currently, the dominant theory in knowledge transfer and exchange research
seems to be the diffusion of innovations (Rogers 1995), and researchers are
producing a growing number of tailored models and frameworks based on its
categories and concepts (Berwick 2003; Herie and Martin 2002), often with
the addition of components drawn from communications or organizational
theory (Crosswaite and Curtice 1994; Dobbins et al. 2002) or, in situations in
which the intended user group includes individual practitioners, behavior
change theory (Logan and Graham 1998).

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Third, concurrent with these changes, knowledge transfer and exchange

theory has grown more grounded and utilitarian. Whereas the two communities theory was vague in its expression and did not suggest specific
interventionsits critics claimed that it lacked explanatory power (Boggs
1992; Wingens 1990)the more recent models and frameworks tend to be
based on formative applied research in specific arenas (often healthcare settings) and to emphasize implications for policy and practice. The focus on
utility has, however, led many models and frameworks to appear rather prescriptive and cookbook-like in form and content.

The Uses of Theory in Knowledge Transfer

and Exchange Research
A theory is a systematic rendering of ideas, concepts, or principles and
the causal or associational relationships among them. It may be the result
of an inductive, data-driven process, or may exist a priori and be applied
deductively to generate or test data. Theories address different levels of
analytic abstraction: substantive, mid-level, or grand (Glaser and Strauss
1967). A theory may be presented in a textual narrative, mathematical language, or graphic form (e.g., charts or matrices). A model is a representation of
a theory or a set of concepts. Similarly, a framework is a representation of key
theoretical concepts and their underlying relational structures. Although models
and frameworks may not include all of the features of complete theories, they
are often designed so as to facilitate practical application of theoretical ideas.
Thus, they may be presented as algorithms, templates, or guides.
The theories, models, and frameworks that have proliferated in the field
of knowledge transfer and exchange research serve a variety of purposes.
First, they explain major components and processes. Two communities
theory, for example, identified culture as a significant factor in knowledge
utilization and linked utilization failures to cultural differences in language,
timing, and other conditions of (mis)communication (Caplan 1979).
Second, theories, models, and frameworks provide direction to the development of knowledge transfer interventions or the evaluation of knowledge
transfer projects. The models developed by Elliott and Popay (2000),
Hanney et al. (2003), and Logan and Graham (1998), among many others,
link the objectives and outcomes of knowledge transfer work to the stages
of a knowledge transfer project, the tasks that occur in each stage, and the
contexts in which transfer projects are undertaken and accomplished. In so

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doing, they instruct readers in how to plan a project and suggest both logic
models and domains that may be used in the assessment of project results.
Third, and finally, knowledge transfer theories, models, and frameworks
play a role in the development of research agendas by suggesting general
and specific areas for further research. Carol Weisss (1979) early work on
the seven meanings of research utilization has had an ongoing influence on
investigations of the settings and circumstances in which different types of
use might be favored. Application of the diffusion of innovations theory has
led to further research on many of the theorys proposed determinants of
adoption and use: for example, studies that investigate the characteristics of
the environments (e.g., organizations) in which knowledge transfer occurs
(or fails to occur).
A complete accounting of theory adoption and use in the field of knowledge transfer and exchange is beyond the scope of this article. However, the
general overview provided by Backer and the subsequent developments
described above suggest that there is a reciprocal relationship between
theory and knowledge transfer practice and research. Just as theory often
leads practitioners and investigators to new endeavors, so project results
and research findings also lead to new theoryor to an awareness of a need
for new theory.
Research in knowledge transfer and exchange has generally been more
focused on using theory to explain, plan, or research transfer and exchange
processes than on using it to understand knowledge and the relationships
between knowledge and these processes. However, the trends noted by
Backer (1991) as early harbingers as a fourth wave (particularly greater
attention to accountability, greater awareness of ethics in research, and the
globalization of knowledge), along with an increasing recognition of the
ways in which knowledge is constituted by interactive knowledge transfer
(Elliott and Popay 2000), suggest a need for theory that is focused on the
knowledge part of knowledge transfer and exchange. Social epistemology
is a source for such new theory.

Social Epistemology
Social epistemology is the study of the social contours of knowledge.
Librarians Margaret Egan and Jesse Shera coined the term in 1952 (Budd
2002; Zandonade 2004). Writing about the need for an underlying theory of
bibliography, they defined social epistemology as the study of those
processes by which society as a whole seeks to achieve a perceptive or

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understanding relation to the total environmentphysical, psychological,

and intellectual (Egan and Shera 1952, 132). Philosophers who work in
the arena of social epistemology generally credit Egan and Shera with little
more than inventing the term, emphasizing the fields intellectual lineage
within the history of philosophy. In that history, Plato, John Locke, Karl
Marx, and Jurgen Habermas, among others, are all seen to have considered
the social aspects of knowing or of knowledge (Goldman 2001; Schmitt
1994). Most accounts of social epistemology also acknowledge overlap
between its concerns and those of the sociology of knowledge, the history
and philosophy of science, and social studies of science (Fuller 2002;
Goldman 2001; Resnik 1996).
The remit of social epistemology is broad, and its scholars engage a variety of topics from a range of perspectives. Schmitt (1994) has identified three
strands of substantive focus: the role of social factors in individual knowledge; the organization of the cognitive labor of individuals and groups of individuals; and the nature of collective knowledge (p. 4). Goldman (2001, 2002)
has described six dimensions of difference in the body of work that constitutes
the social epistemological project. These are the approach, the meanings of
knowledge and of the social, the methodology (empirical research, rhetoric,
logic, and argument), the scope (universal knowledge or specialized bodies of
knowledge, such as science), and the kinds of knowledge practices of interest
(global or domain-specific practices).
Social epistemologists use two main approaches: descriptive and normative
(Goldman 2001; Resnik 1996). Descriptive social epistemology aims to paint
a reliable picture of the structures and processes that constitute knowledge in
a specific setting or context. For example, there are many fieldwork-based
studies of actual knowledge production activities in scientific research laboratories (Knorr-Cetina and Mulkay 1983; Latour and Woolgar 1979). By contrast,
normative social epistemology seeks to identifyeither empirically or through
formal logicthe structures and processes necessary for meeting certain
knowledge-related goals. An example is Fullers work on how to organize
knowledge production and dissemination if the goal is to democratize knowledge (Fuller 2002).
The meaning of knowledge is a second dimension of difference. Some
social epistemologists espouse a definition of knowledge that counts only
justified true belief as knowledge. This veristic or classical model most often
is combined with a normative approach. Thus, the key questions in veristic
social epistemology have to do with identifying and promoting the social
or cultural conditions that promote the attractional force of truth over falsehood (Goldman 2002, 160) in knowledge production and dissemination.

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Constructivist social epistemology, on the other hand, views knowledge as a

social construction. The defining feature of knowledge is not that it is true or
false, but whether it is accepted and when and how it is applied in specific contexts. Thus, studies using a constructivist model of social epistemology address
questions about why particular theories or kinds of knowledge become dominant in specific circumstances. In the sociology of science, for example, the
strong programme associated with the University of Edinburgh can be characterized as pursuing a constructivist social epistemology (Barnes and Edge
1982).
The social is also variously defined within social epistemology, encompassing everything from dyadic interpersonal communication to organizational environments to class interests to the influence of culture and history
(Goldman 2002). Key to understanding the social in social epistemology
seems to be its function in distinguishing social epistemology from traditional epistemology. While the latter is oriented toward the internal cognitive processes of individuals, the former focuses on the external social
structures and processes that influence individual knowing and the production of collective knowledge.
An issue that has been of much interest to social epistemologists is expertise. A brief review of work pertaining to expertise will illustrate some specific
features of the foregoing general description of social epistemology.
The complexity and sheer volume of knowledge in the modern world make
it impossible for any one person to know everythingor even to know what
it is that he or she does not know! Experts have thus become important sources
of knowledge in many situations (Hardwig 1991). Expertise is, inherently,
a social form of knowledge (Goldman 2002), that is, one enacted in the relationship between the expert and the individual or group seeking advice or
guidance. Both veristic and constructivist social epistemologists have
examined expertise. Veristic social epistemology has focused on the normative questions of when and how resort to experts can, in Goldmans
words, promote truth over falsehood. A key aspect of this endeavor has
been to identify the ways in which expert testimony (statements about the
nature of reality) can be assessed to increase the likelihood that such statements reflect (and thus also advance) justified true belief (Goldman
2002; Schmitt 1994). Social epistemologists use the concept of justification
to talk about such assessment. It refers to the process of, and the types of
evidence that can be marshaled in, judging the truth-value of expert testimony. Experts may be justified by their own arguments, by the degree to
which they agree with other experts, by third party appraisal, by examination of their interests, or by their track records (Goldman 2002). The related

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concepts of warrant and epistemic authority refer to the extent to which

someones claim to expertise is accepted by another person (Budd 2002,
97), that is, whether the expert has been justified.
Constructivist social epistemologists have asked very different questions
about expertise. They argue that justification, warrant, and epistemic
authority are not truth-linked but rather reflections of extant social relations
in the larger society. Both Fricker (1998) and McConkey (2004) have, for
example, written about the ways in which justification may favour those
groups who are already powerful and privileged (McConkey 2004, 198)
and disadvantage marginalized or oppressed groups, a situation they call
epistemic injustice. The task for a normative and constructivist social epistemology, then, is to devise more equitable strategies for justification to ensure
that testimony from members of marginalized and oppressed communities
may also be justified and counted as knowledge.

Social Epistemology as Theory for Knowledge

Transfer and Exchange Research
A universal conception of social epistemology would study all forms of
social interaction that have significant knowledge-producing or knowledgedisseminating properties. (Goldman 2002, 197)

Each variant of social epistemology described abovedescriptive and normative, veristic and constructivistcan contribute to the explanatory, intervention and evaluation development, and research agendasetting functions of
theory in knowledge transfer and exchange described earlier. Bringing social
epistemology into knowledge transfer and exchange will shift the focus of the
field, enhancing the breadth and depth of research questions and approaches.
Explanation. A descriptive approach would aid researchers in the task of
identifying the determinants and results of knowledge transfer and exchange
projects. Guided by social epistemology, the focus of this endeavor might
change from understanding the process of transfer to one of understanding
the impact of different settings or transfer strategies on the knowledge that
is being transferred. From a veristic perspective, the aim would be to understand the conditions under which justified truth belief is more easily transferred than belief that is not justified. From a constructivist perspective, the
task would be to map the power dynamics of different knowledge transfer
strategies and the impact of these dynamics on what does and does not

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count as knowledge. In either case, the normative project then would be

to develop a typology of best practices to promote the transfer of specific
kinds of knowledge.
Intervention and evaluation development. Although social epistemology
is not, in general, considered an applied discipline, its concerns and concepts can be adapted for practical use. For example, the work on expertise
described in the previous section might lead to specific interventions or
evaluation approaches. An intervention based upon a veristic social epistemology of expertise could improve the quality of expert advice obtained by
knowledge users by aiding in the development of a set of justification
guidelines to be used when assessing the expertise of a potential knowledge
producer partner. Such guidelines might include information about evaluating the quality of the experts arguments, the nature of the experts interests,
the degree to which the expert is in agreement with other experts, the
appraisal of the expert by a third party, or the nature of the experts track
record. An evaluation of a knowledge transfer project guided by a normative constructivist social epistemology might explore the social locations
and statuses of the knowledge producers and knowledge users involved,
seeking to determine which relevant voices might not have been heard, and
thus what knowledge was not transferred.
Research agenda. Perhaps most important, social epistemology provides
fertile ground for provoking interesting and productive research questions
and agendas in knowledge transfer and exchange. One likely agenda would
be to determine the optimum social organization of knowledge transfer and
exchange. Such a project would begin with a process to reach broad consensus among the project stakeholders about the projects knowledge goals.
Investigators would then pursue a number of specific questions about the
forms and strategies that would lead to the attainment of these goals: What
decisions about focus and resources need to be made in the course of a
knowledge transfer project? Who should have the decision-making power?
Producers? Users? A new class of knowledge policymakers trained to make
informed yet unbiased choices about scientific agendas and resource distribution (Fuller 2002)? What should be the division of labor among these
potential workers in the knowledge transfer enterprise? A second possible
research agenda is an explicitly critical one: Whose interests are being
served by a specific knowledge transfer endeavor? What are the likely
impacts on current social and power dynamics if the knowledge aims of this
project are accomplished? Who is and is not being heard? What does and

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does not count as knowledge? A broader and equally reflexive research

agenda could also be supported by social epistemology: knowledge transfer and exchange has become an organizational and institutional priority in
many settings. What are the social factors that have brought us to the collective knowledge that knowledge transfer is a good thing? What are the
social implications of the recent institutional and organizational push to
emphasize knowledge transfer and exchange?

Conclusion
Theory in knowledge transfer and exchange risks turning narrow and
mechanistic. Social epistemology is an esoteric subject, one that can be difficult to access without training in philosophy, but its core ideas are extremely
relevant to understanding the practice of knowledge transfer and to making
research in knowledge transfer broader and more intellectually dynamic.
Adoption of concepts from social epistemology will push researchers to focus
on knowledge to better define the substance of what it is they are transferring
(a descriptive project) and what it is they want to transfer (a normative one).
Both veristic and constructivist social epistemologies provide frameworks for
critical examination of current knowledge transfer practices and research.
While the former may suggest questions about effectiveness, the latter directs
attention to issues of power and equity. Such examination is important, even
crucial, to meeting the expectations of accountability and ethical conduct in
the context of globalization that characterizes the present fourth wave of
knowledge transfer and exchange.

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Nora Jacobson is a scientist in the Health Systems Research and Consulting Unit at the Centre
for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, Canada, and an assistant professor at the University of
Toronto.

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