L’appropriation d’un open‑space au prisme de l’approche de l’acceptation située

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to use the situated acceptance approach from clinical usage (Bobillier Chaumon, 2016) to try to understand the workspace appropriation process. Initially developed to explain the process of new technology acceptance by users in a professional environment, this approach is here transposed to the appropriation of workspaces converted into open-plan spaces. The exploratory study presented in the article is based on 3 collective interviews conducted with a group of 10 local managers from a large regional authority. The analysis of the 4 constitutive dimensions of this approach questions normative conceptions of workspace appropriation by showing that the process of appropriating open spaces is multidimensional, dynamic, differentiated and highly contextualized. The results also show the importance of activity mediation in this process. Finally, while they legitimize the upstream co-construction of workspace development projects by their designers and their users, they also demonstrate the limits of the transposition of the chosen approach to devices other than those for which it was initially mobilized.

Keywords

• open-space
• situated acceptance
• appropriation
• clinical usage
• territorial community