Evaluation Methods in Process-Aware Information Systems Research with a Perspective on Human Orientation

Research on process-aware information systems (PAIS) has experienced a dramatic growth in recent years. Lately, a particular increase of empirical studies and focus on human oriented research questions could be observed, leading to an expansion of applied evaluation methods in PAIS research. At the same time, it can be observed that evaluation methods are not always applied in a systematic manner and related terminology is at times used in an ambiguous way. Hence, the paper aims at investigating evaluation methods that are typically employed in PAIS research with a special focus on human orientation. The applied methodology includes a literature review, an expert survey, and a focus group. The authors present their findings as a collection of typical evaluation methods and the related PAIS artifacts. They highlight which evaluation methods are currently used and which evaluation methods could be of interest for future PAIS research efforts.