An Analysis of the Commonality and Type of Preintervention Assessment Procedures in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (2000–2015)

We reviewed all issues of the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (JOBM) from 2000 through 2015 to identify the percentage of empirical articles, which utilized some form of preintervention assessment. In addition, we categorized five types of assessment used and compared the number of assessments conducted in each category. Finally, because assessment is considered to be particularly important in the subdiscipline of behavioral safety (McSween, 2003), and prior research has not examined the commonality of assessment in this area, we also analyzed the frequency and type of assessment procedures used in behavioral safety and compared this to the use of assessment in OBM in general. Results indicated that 28% of the empirical articles in JOBM used some form of preintervention assessment. Indirect methods were the most often used type of assessment. In addition, 48% percent of the articles in JOBM, which employed a safety-related dependent variable, included some form of assessment. The most frequently used type of assessment in behavioral safety was historical assessment. Based on these data, the use of some form of preintervention assessment in OBM appears to be occurring with some regularity, and assessment in behavioral safety is more common relative to assessment in OBM in general.     

A Review of Procedural Acceptability in Organizational Behavior Management

ABSTRACT

Despite the documented benefits Organizational Behavior Management (OBM) applications can have on service provision for people with developmental disabilities, OBM is not widely practiced in service systems. One variable that may impact the utilization of OBM is how acceptable the associated procedures are to staff. The research on procedural acceptability in OBM is summarized in terms of two primary methods for determining consumer satisfaction with management procedures-rating scales and discrete choices. Results of acceptability assessments utilizing ratings scales have repeatedly indicated high degrees of staff acceptance for virtually all OBM procedures. However, when staff have been asked to choose among management procedures, clear and consistent differences in acceptability have been apparent. Suggested directions for future research focus on improving acceptability assessment methodology, developing guidelines for implementing effective OBM procedures in a manner that is most acceptable to staff, and involving supervisory and professional staff in acceptability evaluations.     

A Literature Review of Organizational Behavior Management Interventions in Human Service Settings from 1990 to 2016

We reviewed the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA), Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (JOBM), and Behavior Analysis in Practice (BAP) from 1990 to 2016, to identify articles that evaluated organizational behavior management interventions in a human service setting. Of those articles, 75 articles met the inclusion criteria for the review, 44 from JABA (1990 to 2016), 22 from JOBM (1990 to 2016), and 7 from BAP (2008 to 2016). We categorized each selected article by setting, employee population, client population, assessment, dependent variable, independent variable, and outcome measures. Results from the review are discussed for all three journals. Recommendations are made to broaden the scope of population and dependent variable targets, include more assessments, and include outcome data when applicable.     

Money and Journal of Organizational Behavior Management Interventions: A Review

Practitioners and business leaders can use monetary data to quantify the financial outcomes of interventions in organizational behavior management (OBM). The primary purpose of this review was to investigate the occurrence and classification of monetary data in the OBM literature. Other purposes were to demonstrate ways in which such data contribute to the measurement of value and to provide recommendations for its reporting and publication. Accordingly, a review was conducted of publications in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. Cumulative yearly results showed that cost data were reported more often than cost plus benefit data, and cost plus benefit data were reported more often than benefit data alone. More cost than benefit data were reported, most often with social validity, followed by institutionalization, then maintenance measures. However, more cost plus benefit data were reported than either cost or benefit data with a maintenance measure. It is concluded that reporting cost and benefit data would be beneficial to the field of OBM.     

The Historical Roots of Organizational Behavior Management in the Private Sector

Abstract

Applications of behavior analysis in the private sector became visible in the late 1960s and early 1970s. By the 1980s, the field of Organizational Behavior Management (OBM) was a well established discipline. This article chronicles the people, events and publications that contributed to the formation of the field, beginning with the precursors in the 1950s and ending in the early 1980s. The contributions of individuals who have been honored by the OBM Network are detailed and emphasized. Although some historical accounts attribute the development of OBM to influences from traditional management fields, the present account, through documentation of the formative events, argues that the field developed in relative isolation from such influences, emanating primarily from Skinner's development of programmed instruction and the advent of behavioral applications in other settings. While application of psychology to the work place predated behavioral involvement, the primary force for the development and growth of OBM came from within the field of behavior analysis.     

Motivation and Complex Verbal Phenomena: Implications for Organizational Research and Practice

The concept of motivation has attracted the attention of scholars in the field of Organizational Behavior Management (OBM) over the last two decades. In this paper, we revisit the behavior analytic conceptualization of motivation and highlight recent developments that may contribute to further research and application in OBM. This paper includes a proposed consideration of verbal stimuli (e.g., rules, goals, and values) as potential intervening variables to motivate performance in organizational settings.     

A Behavioral Interpretation of Situation Awareness: Prospects for Organizational Behavior Management

Situation awareness (SA) is a construct used in human factors research and application. It is typically employed in the design of equipment to facilitate rapid and adaptive responding in dynamic and high-risk environments. Although the theory backing the SA concept is not entirely compatible with behavioral philosophy, components of the analysis and measures employed in SA work can benefit researchers and practitioners in Organizational Behavior Management (OBM). The present discussion includes (a) the definition and context for SA, (b) a behavioral interpretation of SA, (c) the assessment tools used in SA work, and (d) the relevance of SA to behavioral research. This discussion is pertinent to behavior analysts who work in industries where SA terminology is used and seek analytic tools to guide the design of effective interventions.     

A Behavioral Training Program for Managers in City Government

A management training program based on Organizational Behavior Management (OBM) principles was conducted for 32 first-level and upper-level managers in city government. Managers then conducted 19 different behavior change projects with their employees. Each project is described in terms of the number of subjects, dependent and independent variables, length, research design, reliability measures, and results. The overall program was evaluated in terms of behavior change, traineelmanager satisfaction with the training, and effectiveness. Twenty-nine change ratios were calculated by comparing the intervention performance mean with the baseline mean, and in all cases, the change ratio showed that productivity improved. In fourteen case's, productivity at least doubled. The results indicate that employee performance in a governmental organization can be enhanced significantly by use of OBM principles.     

Objective Performance Feedback: Is Numerical Accuracy Necessary?

Performance feedback is ubiquitous in Organizational Behavior Management (OBM); yet its essential components are still debated. It has been assumed that performance feedback must be accurate, but this assumption has not been well established. Two experiments were carried out to research feedback accuracy. Experiment 1 was a single-subject design where performance feedback accuracy was manipulated. Results from Experiment 1 suggested feedback may not need to be accurate to improve performance prompting a follow-up study. Experiment 2 was a repeated measures between-groups design with three types of objective feedback: accurate, high (triple) and low (1/3) inaccurate, and no feedback control. Both accurate and tripled feedback significantly improved performance over the control and low-inaccurate feedback groups. Performance feedback may have reduced time off-task across all three feedback conditions compared to the control. Data from performance feedback research need multi-faceted analysis to fully understand how and why performance feedback changes behavior.     

Leadership theory and research in the new millennium: Current theoretical trends and changing perspectives

Scholarly research on the topic of leadership has witnessed a dramatic increase over the last decade, resulting in the development of diverse leadership theories. To take stock of established and developing theories since the beginning of the new millennium, we conducted an extensive qualitative review of leadership theory across 10 top-tier academic publishing outlets that included The Leadership Quarterly, Administrative Science Quarterly, American Psychologist, Journal of Management, Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Review, Journal of Applied Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Organizational Science, and Personnel Psychology. We then combined two existing frameworks (Gardner, Lowe, Moss, Mahoney, & Cogliser, 2010; Lord & Dinh, 2012) to provide a process-oriented framework that emphasizes both forms of emergence and levels of analysis as a means to integrate diverse leadership theories. We then describe the implications of the findings for future leadership research and theory.     

Discussion of Behavioral Principles in Journal of Organizational Behavior Management: An Update

This study replicated the methods of a previous review and assessed the frequency with which discussions of basic behavioral principles occurred in a sample of research and case studies published in Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. A total of 127 research and case studies published between 2006 and 2015 were reviewed; 67 included a discussion of behavioral principles. The percentage of research articles and case studies discussing behavioral principles was higher than that found in previous research. The most frequently described principle was reinforcement. Our findings also documented a higher percentage of laboratory studies discussed behavioral principles.     

The Discussion of Behavioral Principles in JOBM

Abstract

We addressed the inclusion of behavioral analyses in the research and case study articles published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (JOBM) over the past 5 years (1992–1997). The amount of behavior analysis included in JOBM articles appears to be greater than that found in JABA in the early 1980s. However, the presence of such analyses in JOBM can still be increased. Further, a significant number of articles do not mention how the particular intervention was chosen to address a specific organizational problem. This lack of a functional assessment makes it difficult for readers to decide if a proposed intervention is applicable to a situation with which they might be dealing. Additionally, we reviewed articles and examined the range of those behavioral principles discussed and found little diversity among the principles used. This paper serves to address some of the problems and ramifications associated with this separation and to offer suggestions as to how this situation could be improved.     

The Impact of Skinner's Verbal Behavior on Organizational Behavior Management

In the book Verbal Behavior, Skinner provided a comprehensive, behavioral account of language. While the impact of Skinner's analysis on empirical research has been examined broadly, this review of the literature focused on studies relevant to organizational behavior management (OBM). Both empirical and nonempirical journal articles in OBM were analyzed, along with several influential books in the field. The results of this review indicate that the conceptual framework provided in Verbal Behavior has had virtually no impact on empirical research in OBM and very limited impact on conceptual work. Potential reasons for this lack of influence are discussed, and further research on verbal behavior in organizations is encouraged.     

Ranking of the Most Prolific Authors,Universities, and Organizations in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management

ABSTRACT

Over the years, reviews in behavior analysis have sought to identify the most prolific researchers and institutions. The goal of these reviews was to offer one resource for behavior analysts to identify experts in behavior analysis and quality graduate programs. However, most of these reviews omitted the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (JOBM), making the results less relevant to those who work in organizational behavior management. The purpose of this review was to extend previous findings and identify the most published researchers, academic institutions, and organizations in JOBM since its inception. Furthermore, we calculated the citation rate (per year, per article) for each of the top 20 most published authors. The results, implications, and opportunities for further analysis are discussed.     

Tactics to Ensure Durability of Behavior Change Following the Removal of an Intervention Specialist: A Review of Temporal Generality Within Organizational Behavior Management

The endurance of behavior change over time, including the time period after a behavior specialist has ceased to offer direct services, is an important consideration for both organizational behavior management and behavior analysis in general. This article considers a dozen strategies labelled temporal generality tactics that may foster the maintenance and institutionalization of intervention efforts in organizational settings. The use of such tactics was examined by conducting a comprehensive review of articles published between 1977 and 2014 in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. The results of this review suggest that although follow-up measures are frequently collected, explicit and proactive strategies to systematically increase the success of long-term behavior change are rarely used or researched.     

Motivating Operations in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management: Review and Discussion of Relevant Articles

Every article published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management from 1982 through 2012 that contained the term motivating operation (or a related term) was examined. Seventy-six articles used a relevant term. Authors used the term in attempts to categorize and explain the behavioral effects of many aspects of interventions (e.g., rules, feedback, goal-setting), everyday occurrences in organizations (e.g., nicotine deprivation, top management support), and characteristics of behaving individuals (e.g., optimism, personality state), which on the one hand suggests that the motivating operation concept has been of value in organizational behavior management research as published in the journal. On the other hand, none of the articles demonstrated the successful use of a motivating operation as the term was initially defined, which suggests that the MO concept has been substantially expanded or widely misused by authors of the evaluated articles.     

An Objective Review of the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management

Abstract

This article presents an objective review and analysis of every article published in the Journal of Organizational Behavior Management (JOBM) between 1987 and 1997. The purpose of this review was to replicate and extend the research conducted by Balcazar, Shup-ert, Daniels, Mawhinney, and Hopkins (1989) by providing an objective review and analysis of the second decade of JOBM publications. In doing so, we analyzed several noteworthy trends and patterns occurring within the second decade of the Journal and compared them with the first decade, where applicable. Additionally, we discussed the extent to which the Journal has continued to meet its objectives, and we offered recommendations for future JOBM publications. In general, we found evidence that the Journal has continued to grow in meaningful ways, and we report data that indicate it continues, to some extent, to meet its original objectives. Author affiliation remains largely in academe, although there is evidence that more collaboration is occurring with non-academic authors. The variety of topics addressed by JOBM researchers continues to grow, and the frequency of work simulation studies has increased as well. We also identified areas where future JOBM research could be improved. In particular, more studies should include information on the reliability and social validity of the independent and dependent variables, cost/benefit analyses, and follow-up data.     

我国管理学研究中的测量模型误设及仿真分析

在实证研究中,构念和观测变量之间的关系经常被忽视.本文详细区分了反映式测量模型和构成式测量模型,通过分析我国管理学领域的三本学术刊物2002年到2007年以结构方程模型(SEM)为数据分析工具的实证研究论文,发现我国管理学研究中测量模型误设的情况普遍存在.蒙特卡罗仿真分析表明,测量模型的误设将导致相关路径系数的被显著扩大或缩小,而且可能导致I型错误和Ⅱ型错误.由于现有的SEM软件不能处理构成式测量模型,本文提出了模型细化法和模型分解法,能够将构成式测量模型转换成反映式测量模型.