Call for Papers

A growing literature points to the sociocognitive roots that shape organizations and markets (e.g., Kaplan, 2011; Durand et al., 2017; Cattani, Sands, Porac, & Greenberg, 2018). Key to this line of work is understanding how shared mental models impact and shape producer decisions (Porac, Thomas, Wilson, Paton, & Kanfer, 1995; Cattani, Porac, & Thomas, 2017) and audience-based evaluations (Hsu and Hannan, 2005). Various theoretical perspectives have originated from these premises, including work on categories  (Negro, Koçak, & Hsu, 2010; Montauti & Wezel, 2016; Durand, Granqvist, & Tyllström, 2017), labels (Zunino, Suarez, & Grodal, 2019; Granqvist, Grodal, & Woolley, 2012), optimal distinctiveness (Zuckerman, 2016; Zhao & Glynn, 2022), and institutional entrepreneurship (Khaire & Wadhwani, 2010; Jones, Maoret, Massa, & Svejenova, 2012), all aimed to improve our knowledge of the sociocognitive determinants of organization and market-level outcomes.
 
Across these perspectives, organizational features/attributes may be juxtaposed against one another in a sociocognitive space, “whose dimensions are the features that people use as the mental representations of the concept” (Hannan et al., 2019: 111; Grodal & Kahl, 2017). Positioning organizations in sociocognitive space informs concepts of similarity (Negro, Hannan, & Rao, 2011), distinctiveness (Haans, 2019), ambiguity (Boulongne & Durand, 2021), typicality (Sonenshein, Nault, & Obodaru, 2017), and deviance (Rao, Monin, & Durand, 2005). The sociocognitive space in which organizations are compared is consequential for competitive sensemaking, resource acquisitions, and social evaluations.
 
A full consideration of the impact of the sociocognitive space, however, cannot ignore the physical space in which organizations operate and markets are contextualized. Social mechanisms contribute to the enduring influence of communities (Marquis & Battilana, 2009) as well as to the emergence of regional identities (Romanelli & Khessina, 2005). This is due to the fact that, from a cognitive standpoint, physical proximity between objects profoundly effects similarity assessments (Casasanto, 2008; Boot & Pecher, 2010). These insights have been applied to organizations, finding that geographic proximity affects competition between organizations (Wezel et al., 2006), practice diffusion (Lounsbury, 2007), and location choice (Dupin & Wezel, 2023; Beck et al., 2019). At a more micro level, research at the intersection of strategy and marketing has examined the behavioral consequences of physical proximity in advertisement placements (Kim & Kim, 2022) and shelf space (Giarratana et al., 2021).
 
Yet the scattering of this research across different research camps has hampered a thorough understanding of how physical and sociocognitive positioning interact in shaping organizations and markets, and special attention is required for potential opportunities to integrate theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches. To this aim, we invite submissions to this sub-theme from scholars with different theoretical backgrounds, taking either a producer- or audience-based view, aimed at investigating a wide range of outcomes relevant to organizations and markets. We also hope to bring together submissions using diverse methodological approaches (e.g., quantitative, qualitative, mixed) and multiple levels of analysis. Questions that may be addressed include, but are not limited to, the following:

• How can different theoretical perspectives be mobilized to improve our understanding of the intersection between sociocognitive and spatial positioning?

• What is the influence of a producer’s physical positioning on a producer’s positioning in sociocognitive space?

• How does the interaction between sociocognitive and geographic positioning affect organizational and/or market-level outcomes?

• How can sociocognitive and/or physical positioning be leveraged strategically to affect audiences’ perceptions and evaluations? How do such evaluations impact the organizational ability to access critical resources?

• How can established and/or new methodological approaches be leveraged to enhance the investigation of the sociocognitive positioning and its interaction with physical/geographic positioning?

References

• Beck, N. Swaminathan, A., Wade, J. and Wezel, F.C. 2019. Industry Clusters and Organizational Prototypes: Evidence from the Franconian Brewing Industry. Journal of Management, 45: 2978-3008.
• Boot, I., & Pecher, D. 2010. Similarity is closeness: Metaphorical mapping in a conceptual task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 63(5): 942–954.
• Boulongne, R., & Durand, R. 2021. Evaluating Ambiguous Offerings. Organization Science, 32(2): 257–272.
• Casasanto, D. 2008. Similarity and proximity: When does close in space mean close in mind? Memory & Cognition, 36(6): 1047–1056.
• Cattani, G., Porac, J. F., & Thomas, H. 2017. Categories and competition. Strategic Management Journal, 38(1): 64–92.
• Cattani, G., Sands, D., Porac, J., & Greenberg, J. 2018. Competitive Sensemaking in Value Creation and Capture. Strategy Science, 3(4): 632–657.
• Durand, R., Granqvist, N., & Tyllström, A. 2017. From categories to categorization: A social perspective on market categorization. In From categories to categorization: Studies in sociology, organizations and strategy at the crossroads. Emerald Publishing Limited.
• Dupin, L., & Wezel, F. C. 2023. Artisanal or Just Half Baked: Competing Collective Identities and Location Choice Among French Bakeries. Administrative Science Quarterly, forthcoming.
• Giarratana, M. S., Pasquini, M., & Santaló, J. 2021. Leveraging synergies versus resource redeployment: Sales growth and variance in product portfolios of diversified firms. Strategic Management Journal, 42(12): 2245–2272.
• Granqvist, N., Grodal, S., & Woolley, J. L. 2012. Hedging Your Bets: Explaining Executives’ Market Labeling Strategies in Nanotechnology. Organization Science, 24(2): 395–413.
• Haans, R. F. J. 2019. What’s the value of being different when everyone is? The effects of distinctiveness on performance in homogeneous versus heterogeneous categories. Strategic Management Journal, 40(1): 3–27.
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• Khaire, M., & Wadhwani, R. D. 2010. Changing Landscapes: The Construction of Meaning and Value in a New Market Category—Modern Indian Art. Academy of Management Journal, 53(6): 1281–1304.
• Kim, H., & Kim, B. K. 2022. To be in Vogue: How mere proximity to high-status neighbors affects aspirational pricing in the U.S. fashion industry. Strategic Management Journal, 43(6): 1208–1230.
• Koçak, Ö., Hannan, M. T., & Hsu, G. 2014. Emergence of Market Orders: Audience Interaction and Vanguard Influence. Organization Studies, 35(5): 765–790.
• Lounsbury, M. 2007. A Tale of Two Cities: Competing Logics and Practice Variation in the Professionalizing of Mutual Funds. Academy of Management Journal, 50(2): 289–307.
• Marquis, C., & Battilana, J. 2009. Acting globally but thinking locally? The enduring influence of local communities on organizations. Research in Organizational Behavior, 29: 283–302.
• Montauti, M., & Wezel, F. C. 2016. Charting the Territory: Recombination as a Source of Uncertainty for Potential Entrants. Organization Science, 27(4): 954–971.
• Negro, G., Koçak, Ö., & Hsu, G. 2010. Research on categories in the sociology of organizations. In Categories in markets: Origins and evolution. Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
• Negro, G., Hannan, M. T., & Rao, H. 2011. Category Reinterpretation and Defection: Modernism and Tradition in Italian Winemaking. Organization Science, 22(6): 1449–1463.
• Porac, J. F., Thomas, H., Wilson, F., Paton, D., & Kanfer, A. 1995. Rivalry and the Industry Model of Scottish Knitwear Producers. Administrative Science Quarterly, 40(2): 203–227.
• Rao, H., Monin, P., & Durand, R. 2005. Border Crossing: Bricolage and the Erosion of Categorical Boundaries in French Gastronomy. American Sociological Review, 70: 968–991.
• Romanelli, E., & Khessina, O. M. 2005. Regional Industrial Identity: Cluster Configurations and Economic Development. Organization Science, 16(4): 344–358.
• Sonenshein, S., Nault, K., & Obodaru, O. 2017. Competition of a Different Flavor: How a Strategic Group Identity Shapes Competition and Cooperation. Administrative Science Quarterly, 62(4): 626–656.
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• Zunino, D., Suarez, F. F., & Grodal, S. 2019. Familiarity, creativity, and the adoption of category labels in technology industries. Organization Science, 30(1), 169-190.
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