Which One Goes Well with? Exploring the Link between Theoretical Perspectives and Research Contexts in Open Innovation Research

AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the possible relation between the most mentioned theoretical perspectives and the most studied research contexts in Open Innovation (OI) literature. To do this, a meta-review of highly cited literature reviews on OI was conducted to identify the most acknowledged theories and contexts. Articles including these concepts were retrieved with the software ‘Publish or Perish’ and analyzed with a qualitative approach to propose some clear relationships. The main results show that researchers apply similar theories to study certain research contexts, and this seems driven by promising publications trends. Altogether, the findings suggest that researchers are following a widening-narrowing approach of the theories and contexts used to study and validate OI. This paper also illustrates managers with relevant contexts e.g. industries, in which OI has been already adopted, motivating the implementation of OI efforts and practices in their practitioners contexts