In their focal article, Aguinis et al. (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017) provided a bibliometric analysis of our six industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology textbooks, noting among other things the sources, articles, and authors we collectively cited the most. Their analysis provides information about what we cited but not why. In this commentary on their article, our goal is to provide some insights into our process in deciding what sources to include and what not to include in our textbooks. Although each of us has our own way of deciding on the content of our books, there is enough commonality that we decided to write this commentary together.
Each of us has authored or coauthored an I-O psychology textbook that has gone through multiple revisions. Our process for deciding on the content for the first edition is quite different from the process for subsequent revisions. For the first edition, an author confronts the sometimes daunting task of summarizing an entire field in a single volume, keeping in mind that the audience consists of undergraduate students with little or no I-O psychology background. Thus, we focus on a general survey of existing information with both historical (older) citations as well as current ones. Subsequent editions focus on updating—adding new sources and topics and deleting old sources and topics that might no longer be important enough to include. For every edition there is a balancing act in being sure to cover major topics and material that most if not all instructors will consider essential (e.g., leadership and selection) while at the same time including some cutting-edge new topics (e.g., big data and I-O's role in human rights issues). Reasonable authors will disagree on some topics, but there is a great deal of consensus, as witnessed by the similarity in content across different textbooks.
Beyond the decision of what topics to include, there is the task of choosing what to cite, and here is a place where differences can certainly arise. There is a tension between being scholarly and citing original sources and appearing fresh and up-to-date by citing new sources. An author revising a textbook in late spring 2017 will sprinkle in as many 2016 and 2017 sources as possible. As authors look for sources to cite for a particular point, there is room for us each to choose a different source. However, some sources are particularly good exemplars for a point, or are well known and salient so that different authors will be aware of them, increasing the likelihood of citing them.
Editors will tell new textbook writers that the key to a successful book is to be enough like all the other books so that instructors would not have too great a difficulty in adopting yours yet be different enough to give instructors a reason to adopt yours. When many of us sat down to write our first editions, we examined the content of the other available books. We looked at the chapter structure (e.g., everyone has a chapter on selection), and we looked at the topics covered. We also relied on our experience teaching the course and used our syllabi and lectures to help rough out the structure of the book. We made decisions about which topics are necessary to cover and which could be ignored. For example, each of our books covers motivation, but the specific motivation theories we include are not always the same. The necessary topics include a great deal of I-O psychology foundational material—the major methods and theories that are important for research and often practice as well. Some original sources are typically cited, such as Flanagan (Reference Flanagan1954) for the critical incident technique and Vroom (Reference Vroom1964) for expectancy theory. In addition, the latest sources possible are included when research support is discussed. Thus if we discuss the support for expectancy theory, we aim to find some sources that are not too old. Ultimately, the goal is to have enough new sources that the book is fresh, modern, and updated to be relevant to the current world of work. It is impossible and impractical, however, to include too many studies on any given topic, as doing so runs the risk of creating overly content-heavy textbooks that may confuse or overwhelm the typical college student. As such, we seek to cite research that effectively summarizes the state of the literature or draws formidable conclusions based on sound theory, methodology, and analytic approaches.
There are characteristics of articles that make them more likely to be included in a textbook. Articles that present a popular theory, especially one of the classics, have a good chance of finding a home in a textbook. Articles that empirically support popular theories also have a chance, although meta-analyses are more attractive than single studies when authors want to summarize an area. Given the vast amount of information we hope to cover in a limited amount of space, we often rely on current meta-analyses that synthesize many years’ worth of research, as it takes less space to describe a meta-analysis than to provide a summary of several primary studies (not to mention the ability of meta-analyses to effectively address contradictory findings in the literature). We are also likely to include articles that introduce a popular method that is used by researchers and/or practitioners, such as a behaviorally anchored rating scale. Finally, articles that are widely recognized as seminal in the development of an important area have a good chance of being cited.
How do we decide on which sources to cite? There is some variability among textbook authors, but most of us rely heavily on articles from the standard I-O psychology research journals including Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP), Personnel Psychology (PPsych), Journal of Organizational Behavior (JOB), Journal of Management (JOM), International Journal of Selection and Assessment (IJSA), Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology (JOOP), Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (OBHDP), and Journal of Business and Psychology (JBP). In the Web of Science Journal Citations Report (JCR) approach used by Aguinis et al. (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017), all of these journals are classified as cross-disciplinary. In contrast, the list of purely applied psychology journals in the JCR approach is brief (Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Applied Psychology: An International Review, Human Performance). Regardless of how these journals are categorized by the JCR, we tend to heavily cite articles from the most traditional research journals in the field, especially JAP and PPsych. Indeed, 35% of the citations listed in Aguinis et al.’s table 2 are to articles published in JAP and PPsych. We would respectfully disagree with the authors of the lead article that only 2% of the top citations are to “purely I-O psychology journals” (Aguinis et al., Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017, p. 529), because we see JAP and PPsych as being as close to purely I-O psychology outlets as there are. We then supplement with articles and studies from applied sources, book chapters, and professional publications to increase interest and relevance to the work world. Along these lines, studies that apply theories and techniques in real-world settings are likely to be cited. Because such studies are rare, some of us choose to incorporate such professional and business publications as HR Magazine, Training, or Harvard Business Review rather than academic journals to provide the applied examples.
As mentioned earlier, we tend to approach revisions somewhat differently. Here the goal is to update the content of the book by bringing in new sources and topics. Major structural changes are avoided as much as possible to make it easy for instructors using an earlier edition to continue to use the book. By the time a textbook is in its fifth or sixth edition, publishers will push authors to keep from expanding the book too much, so there is the need to balance new material by deleting old material. Often the book is refreshed by replacing older references with newer references that make the same point. This is reflected in marketing material for new editions that tout how many new references have been added.
Because revisions focus mainly on new topics, articles likely to be included are those that introduce those topics, or are particularly good exemplars of research on the topic. As with first editions, there is a preference for including new meta-analyses over single primary studies, and sometimes new meta-analyses can replace old meta-analyses on the same topic. Finally, sometimes articles that describe current practice issues will be included, such as articles that summarize current uses of various selection devices.
Although space limitations and the desire to include newer references motivate textbook authors to replace older studies with more current ones, these decisions are often not easy. For, example, from a fairness perspective, we sometimes struggle with replacing a groundbreaking meta-analysis with one that is more current and extensive. Although doing so is solid scholarship, with each new edition the “big names” from the past slowly disappear from the textbooks, and thus to some extent there can be a loss of history.
Finally, our choice to include certain research over others is based in part on our mere exposure to the studies. Although we all try to remain as current as possible, it is likely that we will overlook some studies, fail to stumble on relevant chapters, or be drawn to some topical areas over others. As such, we encourage researchers to send us copies of their conference presentations or publications that are relevant to a particular passage in one of our textbooks. Many researchers seem reluctant to do so out of fear of appearing to be self-promoting, but such submissions have been well received by the textbook authors; we do not know about every relevant study, and author submissions not only make our textbooks better but provide more visibility for the researchers’ good work.
In sum, collectively we authors of the textbooks aim to provide comprehensive, relevant, and meaningful information to our readers. We spend a great deal of time scouring the literature in search of thought-provoking work with findings that are based on sound methodology. It is not surprising that many of the most rigorous publication outlets—those that urge researchers to incorporate theory and sound statistical procedures in their work—are the ones that we are most often pulling from when choosing sources to cite. Given space constraints, it is also not surprising that we cite meta-analyses so often. Further, although it is interesting (and perhaps concerning) that women account for less than one-quarter of the most-cited authors in our textbooks (as do authors residing outside of the U.S.), we can assure readers that this is more a function of the state of the literature than it is our own source selection criteria. Similarly, in terms of the concern that our citation practices indicate that I-O psychology is moving closer to business and management and moving away from psychology, we urge readers to again consider this point with our aforementioned selection criteria in mind. We collectively do our best to have our textbooks reflect the best work in I-O psychology, which over the years has more and more come from I-O colleagues who choose to spend their careers in business schools. Despite where the cited work comes from, Aguinis et al.’s (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017) focal article reflects what we as textbook authors collectively consider the most important work to include in an overview of the I-O psychology field that is suitable for a college-level introduction to the field.
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In their focal article, Aguinis et al. (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017) provided a bibliometric analysis of our six industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology textbooks, noting among other things the sources, articles, and authors we collectively cited the most. Their analysis provides information about what we cited but not why. In this commentary on their article, our goal is to provide some insights into our process in deciding what sources to include and what not to include in our textbooks. Although each of us has our own way of deciding on the content of our books, there is enough commonality that we decided to write this commentary together.
Each of us has authored or coauthored an I-O psychology textbook that has gone through multiple revisions. Our process for deciding on the content for the first edition is quite different from the process for subsequent revisions. For the first edition, an author confronts the sometimes daunting task of summarizing an entire field in a single volume, keeping in mind that the audience consists of undergraduate students with little or no I-O psychology background. Thus, we focus on a general survey of existing information with both historical (older) citations as well as current ones. Subsequent editions focus on updating—adding new sources and topics and deleting old sources and topics that might no longer be important enough to include. For every edition there is a balancing act in being sure to cover major topics and material that most if not all instructors will consider essential (e.g., leadership and selection) while at the same time including some cutting-edge new topics (e.g., big data and I-O's role in human rights issues). Reasonable authors will disagree on some topics, but there is a great deal of consensus, as witnessed by the similarity in content across different textbooks.
Beyond the decision of what topics to include, there is the task of choosing what to cite, and here is a place where differences can certainly arise. There is a tension between being scholarly and citing original sources and appearing fresh and up-to-date by citing new sources. An author revising a textbook in late spring 2017 will sprinkle in as many 2016 and 2017 sources as possible. As authors look for sources to cite for a particular point, there is room for us each to choose a different source. However, some sources are particularly good exemplars for a point, or are well known and salient so that different authors will be aware of them, increasing the likelihood of citing them.
Editors will tell new textbook writers that the key to a successful book is to be enough like all the other books so that instructors would not have too great a difficulty in adopting yours yet be different enough to give instructors a reason to adopt yours. When many of us sat down to write our first editions, we examined the content of the other available books. We looked at the chapter structure (e.g., everyone has a chapter on selection), and we looked at the topics covered. We also relied on our experience teaching the course and used our syllabi and lectures to help rough out the structure of the book. We made decisions about which topics are necessary to cover and which could be ignored. For example, each of our books covers motivation, but the specific motivation theories we include are not always the same. The necessary topics include a great deal of I-O psychology foundational material—the major methods and theories that are important for research and often practice as well. Some original sources are typically cited, such as Flanagan (Reference Flanagan1954) for the critical incident technique and Vroom (Reference Vroom1964) for expectancy theory. In addition, the latest sources possible are included when research support is discussed. Thus if we discuss the support for expectancy theory, we aim to find some sources that are not too old. Ultimately, the goal is to have enough new sources that the book is fresh, modern, and updated to be relevant to the current world of work. It is impossible and impractical, however, to include too many studies on any given topic, as doing so runs the risk of creating overly content-heavy textbooks that may confuse or overwhelm the typical college student. As such, we seek to cite research that effectively summarizes the state of the literature or draws formidable conclusions based on sound theory, methodology, and analytic approaches.
There are characteristics of articles that make them more likely to be included in a textbook. Articles that present a popular theory, especially one of the classics, have a good chance of finding a home in a textbook. Articles that empirically support popular theories also have a chance, although meta-analyses are more attractive than single studies when authors want to summarize an area. Given the vast amount of information we hope to cover in a limited amount of space, we often rely on current meta-analyses that synthesize many years’ worth of research, as it takes less space to describe a meta-analysis than to provide a summary of several primary studies (not to mention the ability of meta-analyses to effectively address contradictory findings in the literature). We are also likely to include articles that introduce a popular method that is used by researchers and/or practitioners, such as a behaviorally anchored rating scale. Finally, articles that are widely recognized as seminal in the development of an important area have a good chance of being cited.
How do we decide on which sources to cite? There is some variability among textbook authors, but most of us rely heavily on articles from the standard I-O psychology research journals including Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP), Personnel Psychology (PPsych), Journal of Organizational Behavior (JOB), Journal of Management (JOM), International Journal of Selection and Assessment (IJSA), Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology (JOOP), Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (OBHDP), and Journal of Business and Psychology (JBP). In the Web of Science Journal Citations Report (JCR) approach used by Aguinis et al. (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017), all of these journals are classified as cross-disciplinary. In contrast, the list of purely applied psychology journals in the JCR approach is brief (Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Journal of Vocational Behavior, Applied Psychology: An International Review, Human Performance). Regardless of how these journals are categorized by the JCR, we tend to heavily cite articles from the most traditional research journals in the field, especially JAP and PPsych. Indeed, 35% of the citations listed in Aguinis et al.’s table 2 are to articles published in JAP and PPsych. We would respectfully disagree with the authors of the lead article that only 2% of the top citations are to “purely I-O psychology journals” (Aguinis et al., Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017, p. 529), because we see JAP and PPsych as being as close to purely I-O psychology outlets as there are. We then supplement with articles and studies from applied sources, book chapters, and professional publications to increase interest and relevance to the work world. Along these lines, studies that apply theories and techniques in real-world settings are likely to be cited. Because such studies are rare, some of us choose to incorporate such professional and business publications as HR Magazine, Training, or Harvard Business Review rather than academic journals to provide the applied examples.
As mentioned earlier, we tend to approach revisions somewhat differently. Here the goal is to update the content of the book by bringing in new sources and topics. Major structural changes are avoided as much as possible to make it easy for instructors using an earlier edition to continue to use the book. By the time a textbook is in its fifth or sixth edition, publishers will push authors to keep from expanding the book too much, so there is the need to balance new material by deleting old material. Often the book is refreshed by replacing older references with newer references that make the same point. This is reflected in marketing material for new editions that tout how many new references have been added.
Because revisions focus mainly on new topics, articles likely to be included are those that introduce those topics, or are particularly good exemplars of research on the topic. As with first editions, there is a preference for including new meta-analyses over single primary studies, and sometimes new meta-analyses can replace old meta-analyses on the same topic. Finally, sometimes articles that describe current practice issues will be included, such as articles that summarize current uses of various selection devices.
Although space limitations and the desire to include newer references motivate textbook authors to replace older studies with more current ones, these decisions are often not easy. For, example, from a fairness perspective, we sometimes struggle with replacing a groundbreaking meta-analysis with one that is more current and extensive. Although doing so is solid scholarship, with each new edition the “big names” from the past slowly disappear from the textbooks, and thus to some extent there can be a loss of history.
Finally, our choice to include certain research over others is based in part on our mere exposure to the studies. Although we all try to remain as current as possible, it is likely that we will overlook some studies, fail to stumble on relevant chapters, or be drawn to some topical areas over others. As such, we encourage researchers to send us copies of their conference presentations or publications that are relevant to a particular passage in one of our textbooks. Many researchers seem reluctant to do so out of fear of appearing to be self-promoting, but such submissions have been well received by the textbook authors; we do not know about every relevant study, and author submissions not only make our textbooks better but provide more visibility for the researchers’ good work.
In sum, collectively we authors of the textbooks aim to provide comprehensive, relevant, and meaningful information to our readers. We spend a great deal of time scouring the literature in search of thought-provoking work with findings that are based on sound methodology. It is not surprising that many of the most rigorous publication outlets—those that urge researchers to incorporate theory and sound statistical procedures in their work—are the ones that we are most often pulling from when choosing sources to cite. Given space constraints, it is also not surprising that we cite meta-analyses so often. Further, although it is interesting (and perhaps concerning) that women account for less than one-quarter of the most-cited authors in our textbooks (as do authors residing outside of the U.S.), we can assure readers that this is more a function of the state of the literature than it is our own source selection criteria. Similarly, in terms of the concern that our citation practices indicate that I-O psychology is moving closer to business and management and moving away from psychology, we urge readers to again consider this point with our aforementioned selection criteria in mind. We collectively do our best to have our textbooks reflect the best work in I-O psychology, which over the years has more and more come from I-O colleagues who choose to spend their careers in business schools. Despite where the cited work comes from, Aguinis et al.’s (Reference Aguinis, Ramani, Campbell, Bernal-Turnes, Drewry and Edgerton2017) focal article reflects what we as textbook authors collectively consider the most important work to include in an overview of the I-O psychology field that is suitable for a college-level introduction to the field.