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Computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) is an interdisciplinary field that studies how computing and communication technologies support, mediate, or change the ways people work together. It looks at both the technology and the social practices around it—not just at collaboration software.
What does CSCW study?
CSCW examines cooperative activity alongside the systems people use in it. Researchers ask how technologies are designed and used, how they affect coordination and communication, and how people adapt their shared practices around them. The focus can be a small team, an organization, a community, or a wider network.
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The field is broader than office work. The ACM CSCW 2026 call for papers describes research on technology and collaborative practices across settings including work, home, education, healthcare, the arts, design, entertainment, and social computing. Its listed topics include communication, coordination, awareness, crowdsourcing, and information sharing. See the ACM CSCW 2026 call for papers.
Does CSCW require people to work together at the same time or place?
No. CSCW covers collaboration among people who are co-located or remote, and people who work synchronously or asynchronously. It also considers arrangements that shift between these modes. A shared activity might involve colleagues coordinating in person, a distributed team exchanging information at different times, or a group combining live discussion with later contributions.
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These are not simply technical categories: the location and timing can shape how people communicate, coordinate, and understand one another’s work. The scope of CSCW includes those social dimensions as well as the supporting systems. Interaction Design Foundation’s CSCW overview describes these variations in setting and timing.
How is CSCW different from groupware?
CSCW is the research field; groupware is the technology. Groupware refers to tools designed to support cooperative work. CSCW studies those tools in context: how they are designed, how people use them, and how they support or alter collaborative activity. Calling CSCW a kind of app or a synonym for groupware misses the field’s human and organizational focus.
Where did the term CSCW come from?
The term emerged in the 1980s. In a 1994 historical account, Jonathan Grudin reported that Irene Greif of MIT and Paul Cashman of Digital Equipment Corporation organized a workshop about ten years earlier. Participants from different disciplines shared an interest in technology’s role in work environments and coined “computer-supported cooperative work” for that area. Grudin’s history of CSCW recounts the origin.
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Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →The field’s interdisciplinary roots were also apparent in early scholarship. An invited paper in the 1988 ACM CSCW proceedings considered computer support for design as cooperative work and connected design with communication. The paper is available through the ACM Digital Library.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why does the distinction matter?
Thinking of CSCW as a field rather than a product category helps explain why a tool’s features alone do not determine whether it supports cooperation well. The same technology can work differently depending on the group, its practices, and the setting. CSCW therefore considers both the system and the human activity it supports or affects.
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