Management/OB Research: Bridging an Asian-U.S. Model

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Management/OB Research Bridging an Asian-U.S.
Model

• Timothy A. Judge
• University of Florida
• Doctoral Graduates of Business Administration at
  NTU Conference
• 9 December 2006

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Outline

• The American model
• What causes article to be published?
• What determines impact once published?
• Are American journals publishing more articles by
  Asian scholars?
• Future of American and Asian management research
• Questions and answers

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American ModelWhat causes an article to be
published?

• Caveat I most certainly do not have all the
  answers
• With that in mindwhat follows is a summary of
  what I know

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Recent Decision LetterJournal of Applied
Psychology 9.12.06

• Both reviewers indicate that the theoretical
  underpinnings of your study are weak and have a
  number of related concerns regarding the
  theoretical rationale for your hypotheses,
  ambiguities and confusion in the logic you use to
  build your arguments, and fundamental
  inconsistencies between your treatment of
  constructs and relations and the broader
  literatures from which they are drawn. These are
  fundamental theoretical concerns which, when
  taken together with limitations of your research
  design, raise serious questions about the
  potential incremental contribution of your study
  and paper to the literature.

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American ModelWhat causes an article to be
published?

1. Generating an Idea
2. Designing a Study
3. Getting Data
4. Writing a Paper
5. Submitting a Paper
6. Revising a Paper
7. Publishing a Paper

Focus Today
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Publishing an Article1. Generating an Idea

• Whats a good idea? A mix of
• Methodological quality (independent data sources,
  reliable measures, eliminates confounds, adheres
  to measurement principles)
• Interestingness (novel, thought-provoking,
  controversial)
• Hole in the literature (little or no research
  has looked at X, Y, and Z)
• Note that this cant compensate for a lack of 1
  or 2 (e.g., no one in OB has studied the length
  of managers toenails)
• Drawing from outside area

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Publishing an ArticleInterestingnessDavis (1971)

• Interesting theories deny certain assumptions of
  their audience
• All interesting theoriesattack the
  taken-for-granted worlds of their audiences
• Interesting propositions involve the radical
  distinction between seeming and being, between
  the subject of phenomenology and the subject of
  ontology
• An audience finds a proposition interesting not
  because it tells them some truth they did not
  already know, but instead because it tells them
  some truth they thought they already knew was
  wrong

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Publishing an ArticleDavis (Continued)

• Actually, the mediocre in the social sciences
  (and probably the natural sciences too) can be
  defined as those who take the textbook rules of
  scientific procedures too literally and too
  exclusively. It should be clear from the above
  discussion that those who lack what is called
  "the creative spark" are in fact those who fail
  to take into account the assumption-grounds of
  their audiences.

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Publishing an ArticleExamples Interesting Ideas

• Composition
• What seem to be assorted heterogeneous phenomena
  are in reality composed of a single element
  (Plato)
• What seems to be a single phenomenon is in
  reality composed of assorted heterogeneous
  elements (Aristotle)
• Abstraction
• What seems to be an individual is in reality a
  holistic phenomenon
• What seems to be a holistic is in reality an
  individual phenomenon
• Evaluation
• What seems to be a bad is in reality a good
  phenomenon
• What seems to be a good is in reality a bad
  phenomenon

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Publishing an Article7. Publishing a Paper

• Luck is biggest but least important factor
• When do you stop trying to publish a paper and
  move on?
• There is no clear answer to this, but generally
  if something is rejected twice I downshift
• How can we from our failures?
• With whom do we work?
• Work with people who do it well

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Publishing an ArticleWhat Reviewers Want?

• Clear answers to these questions
• Focus What is this paper about?
• Purpose What is it trying to accomplish?
• Theory More on this in a moment
• Conceptual clarity Are constructs defined? Are
  relationships between them clearly stated?
• Success Can the study do what it sets out to do?
  Does it do that?
• Need Do the findings make a significant
  theoretical and empirical contribution?

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Publishing an ArticleWhat Is a Theory?

• Certain basic assumptions, essential to any
  scientific activity, are sometimes called
  theories. That nature is orderly rather than
  capricious is an example. Certain statements are
  also theories simply to the extent that they are
  not yet facts. A scientist may guess at the
  result of an experiment before the experiment is
  carried out. The prediction and the later
  statement of result may be composed of the same
  terms in the same syntactic arrangement, the
  difference being in the degree of confidence. No
  empirical statement is wholly non-theoretical in
  this sense, because evidence is never complete,
  nor is any prediction probably ever made wholly
  without evidence. The term "theory" will not
  refer here to statements of these sorts but
  rather to any explanation of an observed fact
  which appeals to events taking place somewhere
  else, at some other level of observation,
  described in different terms, and measured, if at
  all, in different dimensions.
• B. F. Skinner (Psychological Review, 1950)

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Publishing an ArticleProcess Is Imperfect

• Contribution often unrecognized
• 41st chair (Descartes)
• Recognition to the recognized
• Matthew effect (Robert Merton)
• For unto every one that hath shall be given, and
  he shall have abundance but from him that hath
  not shall be taken away even that which he hath.
• America bias this is narrowing I think

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Making an Impact

• Now turn to impact once article is published
  (impactpeer recognition)
• Increasingly will become metric of success
• Merton two theories of impact
• Universalism idea that success is built by
  talent and hard work
• Particularism idea that success hinges on
  status, networks, connections, reputation

Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an Impact

• Separating universalism from particularism is
  easier in theory than in practice
• Is journal quality universalistic (good journals
  are indicators of best articles) or
  particularistic (good journals merely confer
  symbols of prestige)?

Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an ImpactIndependent Variables
Article attributes when published, type of article (empirical, review, theoretical), references, content area Universalistic idea research plot (refinement, extension, exploration)
Mixed (UP) journal quality (SSCI impact factor), journal prestige (subjective), article first in issue Universalistic method response rate, common methods, longitudinal, number of studies, student sample, reliable measures
Particularistic top-tier publications of authors, prestige of affiliation of first author, gender of first author Universalistic writing clarity of presentation, implications clearly described, length
Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an Impact

• Articles published in the top 21 management
  journals
• Based on Gomez-Mejia and Balkin (AMJ, 1992)
• For each of the 21 journals, we selected the
  first and last article from the first issue of
  each journal 1990-1994
• Thus, selected roughly 30 articles from each
  journal (6 articles per year) N614

Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an Impact

• Impact was measured with the number of citations
  that had accrued for each article, January
  1990-July 2006, on the ISI Web of Science
• Coded article characteristics using two coders
• Average number of total citations was 41.84

Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an ImpactWhat Mattered Most?

• Exploration ideas (vs. refinement)
• Meta-analyses
• Quality of writing
• Only one methodological variable mattered
• Citation rating (SSCI impact factor) for journal
• Journals subjective prestige
• Number of top-tier articles by the authors
• Prestige of affiliation of the first author

Source Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in
preparation)
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Making an ImpactIncremental Variance Explained

• Primary Review/
• Empiric Theory All Articles
• Articles Articles Combined
• (N342) (N272) (N614)
• Article attributes Controls .058 .048
  .053
• Universalistic attributes .089 .058
  .037
• Mixed universalism and particularism .103
  .138 .110
• Particularistic attributes .005 .030
  .016
• Full model
• Multiple R .684 .686 .645
• Overall Adjusted R2 .428 .433
  .399

Notes Except for Full Model R and adjusted R2,
statistics are unique R2 for variable set. p lt
.05. p lt .01. p lt .001.
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Making an ImpactConclusion

• Universalism and particularism matter
• Good and bad news
• Good news quality of idea and writing appear to
  matter
• So what is good idea?
• Methodological trade-off
• Methodological rigor may get an article accepted
  but it does not affect its impact
• What implications does this have?

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Asia Rising?Presence of Asians in Top Mgmt/OB
Journals

• Undertook study to determine whether Asian
  presence in management/OB research is
  accelerating
• Analyzed percentage of all articles published
  that were authored by individual with Asian
  surname

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Asia Rising?Methodology

• Analyzed publications of Asians in two top
  management journals
• Academy of Management Journal (AMJ)
• Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP)
• Asian Americans (American born) were noted
  included
• Broken down by Asian scholars outside of Asia and
  Asian scholars at Asian institutions

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Asia Rising?Methodology (continued)

• Only Asian countries included that published in
  journals during the time
• India, Japan, Korea (ROK), Mainland China (PRC),
  Singapore, Taiwan (ROC), Vietnam
• Only first three authors counted
• Five two-year periods examined
• 1985-1986, 1990-1991, 1995-1996, 2000-2001,
  2005-2006

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Asia Rising?Academy of Management Journal (AMJ)
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Asia Rising?Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP)
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Asia Rising?AMJ and JAP
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Asia Rising?AMJ and JAP
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Asia Rising?First Authorships AMJ and JAP
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Asia Rising?Conclusions

• Without question Asian presence in top
  management/OB journals is increasing
• Trends appear to be somewhat different at AMJ vs.
  JAP
• But important to remember numbers are converging
• Asian independence is increasing
• Asians employed in Asian universities
• Asians as senior authors on articles

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Asia Rising?Limitations and Extensions

• Only studied two journals and only several time
  intervals
• Would be interesting to look at 21 management
  journals
• This could be idea in itself!
• Asia not monolithic but not enough in my
  analysis to break down by country

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The FutureBridging US/Asian Research

• Does culture always matter?
• Signs of progress
• Asian study blind to culture
• American/Western study that considers cultural
  homogeneity as limitation

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Questions or Comments?
These slides and my articles available
at www.ufstudies.net/tim/VITA