Behavioural operations management - identification of its research program

The rise in popularity of the behavioral operations management field has resulted in several attempts to clearly establish this multidisciplinary field. Given the divergent views of what the field actually includes, this paper attempts to contribute to an ongoing debate about the current state of the field as a research field and its future development. The paper uses Lakatos’ view that suggests that instead of individual theories, scientific progress should be viewed in the context of research programs, which consist of the hard core and the protective belt. To identify subfields, the paper combines the literature review with a co-citation network analysis of the behavioral operations management field between 1957 and 2015. Six clusters are identified. The Domain base cluster represents the hard core of the field, while five other clusters (Newsvendor, Bullwhip and inventory optimization, Social goals, Supplier relationship, and Organizational behavior) represent its protective belt. In addition to the exploration of existing clusters, the analysis in the paper offers an excellent starting point to identify and position further research questions. A study like this is easily replicable and enables following the evolution of the field