LEARNING FROM TESTIMONY ON QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH IN MANAGEMENT

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: King, Andrew; Goldfarb, Brent; Simcoe, Timothy
• 署名单位: Boston University; University System of Maryland; University of Maryland College Park
• 刊物名称: ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0363-7425
• DOI: 10.5465/amr.2018.0421
• 发表日期: 2021
• 页码: 465-488
• 关键词: TO-CARRY LAWS; STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT; model uncertainty; me; CONVERSATION; replication; ECONOMICS; claims; SHALL; tests

摘要

Published testimony in management, as in other sciences, includes cases where authors have overstated the inferential value of their analysis. Where some scholars have diagnosed a current crisis, we detect an ongoing and universal difficulty: the epistemic problem of learning from testimony. Overcoming this difficulty will require responses suited to the conditions of management research. To that end, we reviewthe philosophical literature on the epistemology of testimony, which describes the conditions under which common empirical claims provide a basis for knowledge, and we evaluate ways these conditions can be verified. We conclude that in many areas ofmanagement research, popular proposals such as preregistration and replication are unlikely to be effective. We suggest revised modes of testimony that could help researchers and readers to avoid some barriers to learning from testimony. Finally, we imagine the implications of our analysis for management scholarship and propose hownewstandards could come about.