Longitudinal research has grown in popularity in the field of management and organizations. However, the literature has neglected to consider the important ways in which researchers' temporal decisions can influence observed change in longitudinal studies. Researchers must make a set of temporal decisions to capture change, such as the temporal precision of the hypothesized form of change, the selection of a sample that is expected to exhibit the change, the choice of variables to be measured repeatedly, the frequency of measurements, and the time interval between measurements. However, these decisions typically are based on “educated guesses,” which makes their effects on the observed change unclear. In this paper, we develop a conceptual framework to explain how temporal decisions influence observed change and validate it by meta-analyzing longitudinal studies (k = 268). Specifically, we found that observed change is affected by hypotheses (i.e., temporal precision), the sample (i.e., presence of a change trigger), variables (i.e., variable type and rating source), and measurement occasions (i.e., frequency and time interval). These findings offer insights into the importance of making informed temporal decisions. The implications of our findings are broad and applicable across research streams and theoretical traditions.

中文翻译：

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时间与变化：纵向研究中时间决策的荟萃分析

纵向研究在管理和组织领域越来越受欢迎。然而，文献忽略了研究人员的时间决策影响纵向研究中观察到的变化的重要方式。研究人员必须做出一系列时间决策来捕捉变化，例如假设的变化形式的时间精度、预期表现出变化的样本的选择、要重复测量的变量的选择、测量的频率，以及测量之间的时间间隔。然而，这些决定通常基于“有根据的猜测”，这使得它们对观察到的变化的影响尚不清楚。在本文中，我们开发了一个概念框架来解释时间决策如何影响观察到的变化，并通过荟萃分析纵向研究（k  = 268）对其进行验证。具体来说，我们发现观察到的变化受到假设（即时间精度）、样本（即变化触发因素的存在）、变量（即变量类型和评级来源）和测量场合（即频率和时间）的影响。间隔）。这些发现让我们深入了解做出明智的临时决策的重要性。我们的研究结果具有广泛的意义，适用于各种研究流和理论传统。