RNICE Model: Evaluating the Contribution of Replication Studies in Public Administration and Management Research

Abstract

Replication studies relate to the scientific principle of replicability and serve the significant purpose of providing supporting (or contradicting) evidence regarding the existence of a phenomenon. However, replication has never been an integral part of public administration and management research. Recently, scholars have called for more replication, but academic reflections on when replication adds substantive value to public administration and management research are needed. This article presents the RNICE conceptual model, for assessing when and how a replication study contributes knowledge about a social phenomenon and advances knowledge in the public administration and management literatures. The RNICE model provides a vehicle for researchers who seek to evaluate or demonstrate the value of a replication study systematically. The practical application of the model is illustrated using two published replication studies. Evidence for Practice• Replication is the process of repeating previous research efforts with the aim of confirming or extending previous findings and serves the important purpose of providing supporting (or contradicting) evidence regarding the existence of a phenomenon. • Academic reflections on when and how replication adds substantive value to public administration and management research remain implicit and sparse. • This article presents the RNICE conceptual model to guide both scholars (producers of information) and public administration professionals (consumers of information) when evaluating the contributions of replication studies.

Creaming among Caseworkers: Effects of Client Competence and Client Motivation on Caseworkers’ Willingness to Help

“…The limitations of the study call for future research seeking to replicate our findings. In line with recent calls for increasing scholarly attention to replication endeavors (Pedersen and Stritch 2018; Walker et al 2018), future studies should examine the extent to which our findings hold over variations in persons, settings, and situations. We also encourage further research into the interplay between particular aspects of clients’ competence and motivation.…”

Question order bias revisited: A split‐ballot experiment on satisfaction with public services among experienced and professional users

“…This article contributes to a long‐standing debate about the promises and pitfalls of satisfaction surveys in public decision‐making (e.g., Stipak 1979). Motivated by recent calls for replications in public administration research (Pedersen and Stritch 2018), we show how question order bias in satisfaction generalizes beyond general citizen samples and the US case (Van de Walle and Van Ryzin 2011). Our findings thus echo other studies suggesting caution when using subjective indicators, like user satisfaction, as performance information (Olsen 2015; Andersen and Hjortskov 2016; Marvel 2016; Jilke and Baekgaard 2020).…”

The Effect of the EU‐Brand on Citizens’ Trust in Policies: Replicating an Experiment

“…In terms of Walker, James, and Brewer (2017) this article thus presents exact replications, conceptual replications, and empirical generalizations. In terms of Pedersen and Stritch (2018), the value of this article is in addressing an empirically relevant issue (public branding), with low numbers of replications already existing, adding to internal validity through a conceptual improving (adding a fake brand); and testing the external validity by doing the study in new populations and new time periods. We also address recent calls (Braver, Thoemmes, and Rosenthal 2014;Open Science Collaboration 2015) for doing a meta-analysis on experiments and their replications to identify a population effect size across all studies.…”