Papers should include a critical view of how investigators have made choices regarding each of

the important steps in the research process that we cover in class. What we're really interested

in at each step is how much a single methodological choice dominates the research area, and

therefore the errors inherent in such a dominant choice, that might underlie general conclusions

about substantive phenomena. To reduce some of ambiguity about what these choices or points

of criticism are, you can use the Martocchio and Harrison (1993) paper as a very loose guide,

and you can take cues from the paper grading sheet that I've attached to this syllabus. The text

of the paper (i.e., not counting references, tables, figures, and appendices) should not exceed

25 pages of double-spaced (6 lines per inch, 3 of which contain text), Times-Roman 12-point

proportional text, with one inch margins. The paper is due by 9:00am on Friday, May 2nd. I

want this one electronically. Please email me your write-up as a Word 2003 (.doc) file. I do

not accept late papers or give incompletes. You will have already written the initial draft by

completing the two take-home exercises, so you have no excuses.

We'll talk more about this critique as the semester goes on. As I mentioned above, each of the

exercises will also add to the completion of this paper. In past years some students have used

the paper to gain deep expertise in a topic area and then publish a meta-analytic summary of

the research in that area, using the methodological critique as a guide.

COURSE CALENDAR

SESSION DUE CONTENT

1 - 1/10 Research process; Positivistic & interpretive designs

2 - 1/17 Choosing problems, questions & hypotheses

3 - 1/24 Writing and Publishing

4 - 1/31 Quasi-experimental designs

5 - 2/7 Experimental designs

6 - 2/14 Survey designs

7 - 2/21 Archival research I

8 - 2/28 Exercise 1 Archival research II

Spring Break

9 - 3/14 Time and methods

10 - 3/21 Modes of treating constructs; Observation types

11 - 3/28 Choosing, developing and evaluating measures I

12 - 4/4 Choosing, developing and evaluating measures II

13 - 4/11 Exercise 2 Observations and data analysis

14 - 4/18 Data analysis and general linear modeling

15 - 4/25 (Un)ethical methods

Final Project - 5/2 Due by 9:00am

Week 1

The Research Cycle;

Positivistic and Interpretative approaches to Research

(Note: References for required articles are listed in an order that would generate the best understanding)

MMK: Ch 1-2 | Ch3: p69-72

S&S: Chap 2

Van Maanen, J., Sorenson, J.B. & Mitchell, T.R. 2007. The Interplay between theory and method.

Academy of Management Review, 32(4): 1145-1154.

Davis, G.F. 2010. Do theories of organizations progress? Organizational Research Methods, 13(4): 690-

709.

Lee, A.S. 1991. Integrating positivist and interpretive approaches to organizational research. Organization

Science, 2: 342-365

Suddaby, R. 2006. What grounded theory is not. Academy of Management Journal, 49(4): 633-642.

Wells, W.D. 1993. Discovery-oriented consumer research. Journal of Consumer Research, 19: 489-504.

(Optional)

Cacioppo, J. T., Semin, G. R., & Berntson, G. G. 2004. Realism, instrumentalism, and scientific symbiosis:

Psychological theory as a search for truth and the discovery of solutions. American Psychologist,

59: 214-233.

Week 2

Choosing Problems, Questions, and Hypotheses

S&S: Chap. 4, pp 84-107

Davis, M. S. 1971. That’s interesting! Toward a phenomenology of sociology and a sociology of

phenomenology. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1, 309-344.

Sutton, R. I., & Staw, B. M. 1995. What theory is not. Administrative Science Quarterly, 40: 371-384.

Corley, K.G.. & Gioia, D.A. 2011. Building theory about theory building: What constitutes a theoretical

contribution? Academy of Management Review, 36(1): 12-32.

Oldham, G.R. & Hackman, J.R. 2005. How job characteristics theory happened. In K.G. Smith and M.A.

Hitt (Eds.) Great minds in management: The process of theory development, 151-170. Oxford

University Press: New York.

Klein, K. J., Dansereau, F., & Hall, R. J. 1994. Levels issues in theory development, data collection, and

analysis. Academy of Management Review, 19: 195-229. (not a debate, and not easy to digest, but

a vitally important and widely cited set of prescriptions for the unit of analysis in theorizing).

(Optional -- Debates and Perspectives on Organizational Science)

Edwards, J.R. & Berry, J.W. 2010. The presence of something or the absence of nothing: Increasing

theoretical precision in management research. Organizational Research Methods, 1394): 668-689.

Muchinsky, P. M. 2003. Boxes and arrows. The Industrial-Organizational Psychologist, 41: 130-132.

Organ, D.W., & Bateman, T.B. 1986. Theory and research in organizational behavior. In Organizational

behavior: An applied psychological approach, (pp. 26-40). Plano, TX: BPI.

Priem, R. L., & Butler, J. E. 2001. Tautology in the resource-based view and the implication of externally

determined resource value: Further comments. Academy of Management Review, 26: 57-66.

Harrison, D. A. 2002. Meaning and measurement of work role withdrawal: Current controversies and

future fallout under changing technology. In M. Koslowsky & M. Krausz (Eds.), Voluntary

employee withdrawal and inattendance: A current perspective, 95-132. Plenum Publishing. (read

95-108 if you're interested).

Malhotra, N. K., Peterson, M., & Kleiser, S. B. 1999. Marketing research: A state-of-the-art review and

directions for the twenty-first century. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 27: 160-

183.

Martocchio, J.J., & Harrison, D.A. 1993. To be there or not to be there?: Questions, theories, and methods

in absenteeism research. Research in Personnel and Human Resources Management, 11: 259-328.

(helpful for your eventual critique, but in a broad way)

Lawler, E. E. III. 1985. Challenging traditional research assumptions. In E.E. Lawler et al. (Eds.), Doing

research that is useful for theory and practice, (pp. 1-17). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Brief, A. P. & Dukerich, J. M. 1991. Theory in organizational behavior: Can it be useful? In B. M. Staw

(Ed.), Research in Organizational Behavior, 13: 327-352.

Pfeffer, J. 1993. Barriers to the advance of organizational science: Paradigm development as a dependent

variable. Academy of Management Review, 18: 599-620.

Cannella, A.A. Jr., & Paetzold, R.L. 1994. Pfeffer's barriers to the advance of organizational science: A

rejoinder. Academy of Management Review, 19: 331-341.

(Optional, advantages of Computer Simulations)

Davis, J.P, Eisenhardt, K.M. & Bingham, C.B. 2007. Developing theory through simulation methods.

Academy of Management Review, 32(2): 480-499

Harrison, J.R., Lin, Z., Carroll, G.R. & Carley, K.M. 2007. Simulation modeling in organizational and

management research. Academy of Management Review, 32(4): 1229-1245.

Hudson, L. A., & Ozanne, J. L. 1988. Alternate ways of seeking knowledge in consumer research.

Journal of Consumer Research: 14: 508-521,

Abrahamson, E., & Rosenkopf, L. 1993. Institutional and competitive bandwagons: Using mathematical

modeling as a tool to explore innovation diffusion. Academy of Management Review, 18: 487-517.

Carroll, G. R., & Harrison, J. R. 1998. Organizational demography and culture: Insights from a formal

model and simulation. Administrative Science Quarterly, 43: 637-667.