Encyclopedia of Big Data

Living Edition
| Editors: Laurie A. Schintler, Connie L. McNeely

Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom (DIKW) Pyramid, Framework, Continuum

  • Martin H. Frické
Living reference work entry
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32001-4_331-1
The Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom (DIKW) hierarchy, or pyramid, relates data, information, knowledge, and wisdom as four layers in a pyramid. Data is the foundation of the pyramid, information is the next layer, then knowledge, and, finally, wisdom is the apex. DIKW is a model or construct that has been used widely within Information Science and Knowledge Management. Some theoreticians in library and information science have used DIKW to offer an account of logico-conceptual constructions of interest to them, particularly concepts relating to knowledge and epistemology. In a separate realm, managers of information in business process settings have seen the DIKW model as having a role in the task meeting real world practical challenges involving information (Fig. 1).
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Further Readings

  1. Ackoff, R. L. (1989). From data to wisdom. Journal of Applied Systems Analysis, 16, 3–9.Google Scholar
  2. KM4DEV. (2012). DIKeW model. Retrieved from http://wiki.km4dev.org/DIKW_model
  3. Rowley, J. (2007). The wisdom hierarchy: Representations of the DIKW hierarchy. Journal of Information Science, 33(2), 163–180.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  4. Weinberger, D. (2010). The problem with the data-information-knowledge-wisdom hierarchy. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2010/02/data-is-to-info-as-info-is-not
  5. Zins, C. (2007). Conceptual approaches for defining data, information, and knowledge. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58(4), 479–493.  https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.20508.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Copyright information

© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.University of ArizonaTucsonUSA
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