Theory construction: Finding your contribution

Computers, digital libraries and the Internet in general have led to an explosion of research that is often difficult to keep up with our fields. The vast amount of academic papers available to researchers makes it difficult to determine what to read or even figure out where we can make a contribution. This workshop focuses on the process of theory development and how to find holes in the literature where a contribution can be made. Participants will be made aware of software applications (some of which are open), that can facilitate the theory development process with visualizations, citation analysis graphs and reference software for example. The workshop is unique because it falls in a niche that is not covered in either methodological or philosophy of science texts. Unlike other contributions on theory development which are much more formally presented, this workshop will be much more practical in nature. It is intended to guide the research and theory construction process to make it easier for scholars to be able to successfully and more effectively make a contribution to their fields. It provides a practical and systematic approach to the research process beyond traditional methods of research design or philosophy. Today, contributions are almost random given that they are, for the most part, relying on articles that scholars find in databases with little or no strategies to identify the most relevant or from papers that advisers recommend.