Contextualizing research: Putting context back into organizational behavior research

Contextualizing organizational behavior research means considering the influence of context and illuminating how context influences organizational behavior. In this article, we examine the field of organizational behavior against the criteria of contextualized research, finding it comes up short. We discuss the influences of context and contextual influences and identify ways to contextualize organizational behavior research. We provide examples of contextualized research and outline future directions for contextualized organizational behavior research. Lastly, we issue a call and urge scholars to take up the challenge of putting context back into their organizational behavior research and opening new research pathways and innovative theory for examining organization behavior.