often prove to be difficult. In an attempt to operationalize heterarchies, Schoenherr and Dopko use the concept of reward systems and Relational models theory. Relational models are defined by distinct expectations for exchanges between individuals in terms of authority ranking, equality matching, communality, and market pricing. They suggest that discrepancies in the kind of reward that is used to assign merit and differences in merit assigned to specific groups of individuals can be used as evidence for heterarchical structure. Their study demonstrates differences in the number of women assigned PhDs, the number of women receiving academic appointments in high status academic institutions, and scientific awards. Examples of heterarchical conceptualizations include the Gilles Deleuze/Félix Guattari conceptions of deterritorialization, rhizome, and body without organs. Information studies Numerous observers in the information sciences have argued that heterarchical structure processes more information more effectively than hierarchical design. An example of the potential effectiveness of heterarchy would be the rapid growth of the heterarchical Wikipedia project in comparison with the failed growth of the Nupedia project. Heterarchy increasingly trumps hierarchy as complexity and rate of change increase. Informational heterarchy can be defined as an organizational form somewhere between hierarchy and network that provides horizontal links that permit different elements of an organization to cooperate whilst individually optimizing different success criteria. In an organizational context the value of heterarchy derives from the way in which it permits the legitimate valuation of multiple skills, types of knowledge or working styles without privileging one over the other. In information science, therefore, heterarchy, responsible autonomy and hierarchy are sometimes combined under the umbrella term Triarchy. This concept has also been applied to the field of archaeology, where it has enabled researchers to better understand social complexity. For further reading see the works of Carole Crumley. The term heterarchy is used in conjunction with the concepts of holons and holarchy to describe individual systems at each level of a holarchy. Brain science A heterarchical network could be used to describe neuron connections or democracy, although there are clearly hierarchical elements in both. Sociology and political theory Anthropologist Dmitri Bondarenko follows Carole Crumley in her definition of heterarchy as "the relation of elements to one another when they are unranked or when they possess the potential for being ranked in a number of different ways" and argues that it is therefore not strictly the opposite of hierarchy, but is rather the