Interdisciplinarity: Strengths

During the xDelia baseline interviews, partners were asked what they felt were the strengths of the project. They came up with many aspects, some of which they also felt were potential challenges:

• Interdisciplinarity was seen as a strength because it gave the project access to the expertise in many different domains.
• Partner complementarity in that the different expertises present in the xDelia project; cognitive sensor design, games design, financial and business knowledge, neuroeconomics, are complementary. Are there interdisciplinary projects where the expertises are, in fact, antagonistic?
• Technology: the xDelia project relies on state-of-the art technology such as bio-sensors and virtual trading platforms which give the project strength. Technology is also key to supporting communication between geographically distributed partner institutions, acting not only as a vehicle for communication, but also as a shared repository for the knowledge created. A closed wiki supported by a secure repository is used to support collaborative working and store the outputs. Video conferencing such as Flashmeeting provides records of distributed meetings that all partners can access. What are the roles of technology in supporting interdisciplinarity?
• Leading edge research topic - this strength may relate particularly to the xDelia project, however choice of topic is key in any interdisciplinary research. Are there some research topics that lend themselves more readily to interdisciplinary research than others?
• Time - the question of time came up as both a strength and a challenge. xDelia is a 3 year project which allows time to develop the links that are essential for the smooth operation of an interdisciplinary team. However does this mean that interdisciplinarity is more challenging in shorter timescales?