Contours of the marketing literature: Text, context, point-of-view, research horizons, interpretation, and influence in marketing

Abstract

The marketing literature is the elemental material out of which all of our academic articles are created. It is not possible to conduct an empirical study in academic marketing without referencing the theories, arguments, prior studies, and findings of our literature. While observation, scale development and measurement are all signature features of modern academic marketing, they can only be intelligible when contextualized in terms of the history, structure, and development of theory found in our literature. Despite the fact that 75% of the most cited marketing articles are literature-based, conceptual/theoretical in nature (Clark & Key in AMS Review, 11, 416–431, 2021), our discipline has moved in a methodological/mathematical modelling direction (Yadav, 2010; Key et al., 2020). Yet this move has not increased the influence of the field as many expected. Despite this situation, other than a few articles on the literature review, the marketing literature per se has received little attention. In light of this, the purposes of this paper, are to: 1) extend the limited work on the nature and uses of the marketing literature; 2) encourage the development of studies that have proven influential, namely conceptual/theoretical articles; 3) provide materials for doctoral seminars suitable to nurturing a deeper appreciation of the complexities of our literature and its application in theory development; and 4) provide fresh perspectives for marketing scholars in the best uses of our literature. Borrowing from fields that specialize in the study of academic literatures, the authors identify several important features of the marketing literature, including: how our literature as texts differs from spoken research presentations and why this matters; demonstrating why an article’s context, point-of-view, and research horizons are critical to a reasonable interpretation and use of articles; and how academic marketing articles gain influence.