Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T00:10:46.275Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Toward Polycontextually Sensitive Research Methods

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Debra L. Shapiro
Affiliation:
University of Maryland, USA
Mary Ann Von Glinow
Affiliation:
Florida International University, USA
Zhixing Xiao
Affiliation:
China Europe International Business School, China

Abstract

In this paper we introduce the concept of ’polycontextuality,’ which refers to multiple and qualitatively different contexts embedded within one another. We distinguish polycontextuality from the singularly contextual types of description typically provided by social scientists, and use the case of China to elucidate polycontextual phenomena. Polycontextuality can include verbal- and non-verbal nuances whose understanding is rooted in local, cognitive, emotional and even spiritual references -most of which cannot be easily observed or historically studied. For this reason we recommend the polycontexual sensitive research method to supplement the scientific deductive research typically designed to study observable phenomena based on a singular context (e.g. verbal) that are controllable by the researcher's stimuli and/or measures. Actions for increasing scholars’ polycontextual sensitivity are suggested, and guidelines for the scholar interested in doing high quality indigenous research are offered, using the case of China for illustrative purposes.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © International Association for Chinese Management Research 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Becker, H. S. 1997. Tricks of the Trade: How to Think About Your Research While You’re Doing It. University of Chicago Press: Chicago, Ill.Google Scholar
Blair, J. D., & Hunt, J. G. 1986. Getting inside the head of the management researcher one more time: context-free and context-specific orientations in research. 1986 Yearly Review of managetnent of the Journal of Management, 12: 147166.Google Scholar
Boje, D. M. 1995. Stories of the storytelling organization: a postmodern analysis of Disney as ‘Tamara-land.’ Academy of Management Journal, 38: 9971035.Google Scholar
Boje, D. 2001. Narrative Methods for Organizational and Communication Research. Sage Publications: Thousand Oaks, Calif.Google Scholar
Boyatzis, R., & Taylor, S. 2002. Developing emotional intelligence. In Chowdhury, S. (Ed.), Organization 21C: 225240. Financial Times/Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, N.J.Google Scholar
Brockner, J., Ackerman, G., Greenberg, J., Gelfand, M.J., Francesco, A. M., Chen, Z. X., Leung, K., Bierbrauer, G., Gomez, C., Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. 2001. Culture and procedural justice: the moderating influence of power distance on reactions to voice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 37: 300315.Google Scholar
Bruner, J. 1979. On Knowing. Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Mass.Google Scholar
Burnett, C. 2003. One More Time. Random House: New York.Google Scholar
Chen, Z. X., Tsui, A. S., & Fahr, J. L. 2002. Loyalty to supervisor versus organizational commitment: relationship to employee performance in China. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 75: 339356.Google Scholar
Cheng, J. L. C. 1994. On the concept of universal knowledge in organization science: implications for cross-national research. Management Science, 40: 162168.Google Scholar
Draaisma, D. 2000. Metaphors of Memory: a History of Ideas about the Mind. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.Google Scholar
Edwards, B. 1986. Drawing on the Artist Within. Simon & Schuster, Inc: New York.Google Scholar
Egri, K., & Ralston, D. A. 2004. Generation cohorts and personal values: a comparison of China and the United States. Organization Science, 15: 210220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eisenhardt, K. 2002. Paradox, spirals, ambivalence: the new language of change and pluralism. Academy of Management Review, 25: 703705.Google Scholar
Engwall, L., & Zamagni, V. 1998. Management Education in a Historical Perspective, Manchester University Press: Manchester.Google Scholar
Fahr, J. L., Earley, P. C., & Lin, S. C. 1997. Impetus for action: a cultural analysis of justice and organization citizenship behavior in Chinese society. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42: 421444.Google Scholar
Fairbank, J. 1989. China: Tradition and Transformation. Houghton Mifflin: Boston, Mass.Google Scholar
Fife, W. 2005. Doing Fieldwork: Ethnographic Methods for Research in Developing Countries and Beyond. Palgrave Macmillan: New York.Google Scholar
Gelfand, M. J., Erez, M., & Aycan, Z. 2007. Cross-cultural organizational behavior. Annual Review of Psychology, 58: 479514.Google Scholar
Gibson, C. B., & Zellmer-Bruhn, M. E. 2001. Metaphors and meaning: an intercultural analysis of the concept of teamwork. Administrative Science Quarterly, 46: 274303.Google Scholar
Goleman, D. 1998. Working with Emotional Intelligence. Bantam Books: New York.Google Scholar
Hall, E. T. 1976. Beyond Culture. Anchor/Doubleday: Garden City, NJ.Google Scholar
Hawes, D., & Zelizer, C. 2000. Expanding the field: arts-based approaches to peacebuilding. Institute for Multi-track Diplomacy Newsletter, Summer.Google Scholar
Heron, J., & Reason, P. 2001. The practice of co-operative inquiry: research ‘with’ rather than ‘on’ people. In Reason, P. & Bradbury, P. (Eds.), Handbook of Action Research: Participative Inquiry and Practice: 179188. Sage Publications: Thousand Oaks, Calif.Google Scholar
Hitt, M. A., Keats, B. W., & DeMarie, S. M. 1998. Navigating in the new competitive landscape: building strategic flexibility and competitive advantage in the 21st century. Academy of Management Executive, 12: 2242.Google Scholar
Hofstede, G. 1980. Culture's Consequences: International Differences in Work-related Values. Sage: Beverly Hills, Calif.Google Scholar
Inglehart, R. 1997. Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic, and Political Changes in 43 Societies. Princeton University Press: Princeton, N.J.Google Scholar
Janis, I. L., & Mann, L. 1977. Decision Making: a Psychological Analysis of Conflict, Choice, and Commitment. The Free Press: New York.Google Scholar
Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. 1979. Prospect theory: an analysis of decision under risk. Econometrica, 47: March, 263291.Google Scholar
Kahneman, D., & Tversky, A. 1982. The psychology of preferences. Scientific American, 246: January, 162170.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. 2001. The impact of cultural values on job satisfaction and organizational commitment in self-managing work teams: the mediating role of employee resistance. Academy of Management Journal, 44: 557569.Google Scholar
Kotter, J. P., & Cohen, D. 2002. The Heart of Change: Real-Life Stories of How People Change Their Organizations. Harvard University Press: Boston, Mass.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. 2003. Metaphors We Live by. The University of Chicago Press: Chicago.Google Scholar
Lindholm, N. 1999. Performance management in MNC subsidiaries in China: a study of host country managers and professionals. Asia-Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 39: 1835.Google Scholar
Mencius 1970. Mencius. Penguin Books: London.Google Scholar
Milliman, J., & Von Glinow, M. A. 1998. The academic international research team: small world afterall. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 13: 150155.Google Scholar
Murnighan, J. K., & Conlon, D. E. 1991. The dynamics of intense work groups: a study of British string quartets. Administrative Science Quarterly, 36: 165186.Google Scholar
Nisbett, R. E. 2003. The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently … and Why. Free Press: New York.Google Scholar
Nissley, N. 2002. Tuning-in to organizational song as aesthetic discourse. Culture and Organization, 8: 5168.Google Scholar
Palus, C.J., & Horth, D. M. 1996. Leading creatively: the art of making sense. Journal of Aesthetic Education, 30: 5368.Google Scholar
Peng, K. 1997. Naive dialecticism and its effects on reasoning and judgement about contradiction. Doctoral Dissertation. University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Peterson, M. F., Quintanilla, S., & Antonio, R. 2003. Using emics and etics in cross-cultural organizations tiues: Univeral and local, tacit and explicit. In Tjosvold, D. & Leung, K. (Eds.), Cross-Cultural Management: Foundations and Future: 73102. Ashgate: Burlington, Vt.Google Scholar
Pickstone, J. V. 2001. Ways of Knowing: A New History of Science, Technology, and Medicine. The University of Chicago Press: Chicago, Ill.Google Scholar
Ralston, D. A., Egri, C. P., Stewart, S., Terpstra, R. H., & Yu, K. 1999. Doing Business in the 21st century with the new generation of Chinese managers: a study of generational shifts in work values in China. Journal of International Business Studies, Summer: 415427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reger, R., Gustafson, L., DeMarie, S., & Mullane, J. 1994. Reframing the organization: why implementing total quality is easier said than done. Academy of Management Review, 19: 565584.Google Scholar
Rousseau, D. M., & Fried, Y. 2001. Location, location, location: contextualizing organizational research. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 22: 113.Google Scholar
Schacter, S., & Singer, J. E. 1962. Cognitive, social, and physiological determinants of emotional state. Psychological Review, 69: 379399.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schank, R. C. 1990. Tell Me a Story: a New Look at Real and Artificial Memory. Charles Scribner's Sons: New York.Google Scholar
Shenkar, O., & Von Glinow, M. A. 1994. Paradoxes of organizational theory and research: using the case of China to illustrate national contingency. Management Science, 40: 5671.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steinbeck, J. 1951. The Log from the Sea of Cortez. Viking Press: New York.Google Scholar
Strauss, W., & Howe, N. 1991. Generations: the History of America's Future, 1584-2089. Quill William Morriw: New York.Google Scholar
Teagarden, M., Drost, E., & Von Glinow, M. A. 2005. The life-cycle of academic international research teams. In Shapiro, D. L., Von Glinow, M. A. & Cheng, J. L. (Eds.), Managing Multinational Teams: Global Perspectives: 303336. JAI/Elsevier Press: Oxford, UK.Google Scholar
Teagarden, M. B., Von Glinow, M. A., Bowen, D. E., Frayne, C. A., Nason, S., Huo, Y. P., Milliman, J., Arias, M. E., Butler, M. C., Geringer, J. M., Kim, N., Scullion, H., Lowe, K. B., & Drost, E. A. 1995. Toward a theory of comparative management research: an idiographic case study of the best international human resources management project. Academy of Management Journal, 38: 12611287.Google Scholar
Tinsley, C. H., & Brett, J. M. 2001. Managing work place conflict in the United States and Hong Kong. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 85: 360381.Google Scholar
Trompenaars, F., & Hampden-Turner, C. 1998. Riding the Waves of Culture. McGraw-Hill: New York.Google Scholar
Tsui, A. S. 2004. Contributing to global management knowledge: a case for high quality indigenous research. Asia Pacific Journal of Management, 21: 491513.Google Scholar
Tsui, A. S. 2006. From the editor: contextualization in Chinese management research. Management and Organization Research, 2: 113.Google Scholar
Tsui, A. S., & Lau, C. M. 2002. Research on the management of enterprises in the People's Republic of China: current status and future directions. In Tsui, A. S. & Lau, C. M. (Eds.), The Management of Enterprises in the People's Republic of China: 128. Kluwer Academic Press: Boston.Google Scholar
Von Glinow, M. A., Drost, E., & Teagarden, M. 2002. Converging on IHRM best practices: lessons learned from a globally-distributed consortium on theory and practice. Human Resource Management, 41: 123140.Google Scholar
Von Glinow, M. A., Shapiro, D. L., & Brett, J. M. 2004. Can we talk, and should we?: managing emotional conflict in multicultural teams. Academy of Management Review, 29: 578592.Google Scholar
Whetten, D. A. 2002. Constructing cross-context scholarly conversations. In Tsui, A. S. & Lau, C. M. (Eds.), The Management of Enterprises in the People's Republic of China: 2948. Kluwer Academic Press: Boston, Mass.Google Scholar
Xiao, Z., & Su, S. K. 2003. Keeping others in mind: the very social cognition of Asian managers. In Leung, K., & White, S. (Eds.), Handbook of Asian Management: 315347. Kluwer Academic: New York.Google Scholar
Zhang, B. 1992. Culture conditioning in decision making: a prospect of probabilitistic thinking. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation. Department of Information Systems, London School of Economics.Google Scholar