Surprises, Conflicting Findings, or Questionable Research Practices? A Methodology for Evaluating Cumulative Empirical Analyses and Replication Studies

Critiques about the research practices that the scholars in strategic management engage in have called out that the field of strategic management appears vulnerable to a credibility crisis. As the field accumulates discrepancies between an initial observation and subsequent observations about a theoretical expectation, how do we know that the discrepancies are surprises, conflicting findings or questionable research practices? Questionable research practices that operate in the ambiguous space between what one might consider best practices and academic misconduct alert the research community to confront the discrepancies. Yet, the field does not have a methodology for diagnosing the root causes of discrepancies in cumulative empirical analyses. In the current article, we propose a methodology that uses abductive reasoning in the evaluation of discrepancies. Abductive reasoning is a process for reacting to discrepancies through model reformulation, revision of hypotheses, and addition of new information. The proposed methodology may aid not only authors, but also journal editors and reviewers, in evaluating discrepancies and assessing the merits of replication studies.