Public Relations as a Maturing Discipline: An Update on Research Networks

Abstract

Pasadeos, Renfro and Hanily (1999) investigated the public relations literature's most-cited works in the 1990s and identified research networks. In the present study we expand that work by examining public relations scholarship ten years later. We identify current authors and their publication outlets, taxonomize most-cited works, and draw a co-citation network. Further, we compare current findings with those of ten years earlier and speculate on the state of public relations as a scholarly discipline.

Notes

¹Volume 18, number 2.

²That assumption has not been without challenges. Citations can be made for a number of reasons (self-citation; unfavorable citations, etc.) and simple counts are not necessarily measures of quality. A careful reading of cited works can determine the reasons (positive or negative—or self-serving) for citing them.

³Error in judgment coding for the type of cited work variable could occur if a coder could not distinguish between a public relations journal and other journal, between a public relations book and other book, or between an academic journal and a magazine.

Notes. ∗The Research Productivity Index is the sum of the number of articles authored by the researcher, plus the percentage of authorship credited to the researcher.

Note. ∗Source: Pasadeos, Renfro & Hanily (1999).

∗∗Source: Pasadeos & Renfro (1992).

^#Printed version ceased publication in 1995.

∗Also on the 1990–95 list.

⁴Works, such as Dozier et al.'s (1995), that are cocited with many other works, may be considered central to the cluster, but not necessarily seminal, as the dates of the works in the cluster will attest.