The Leadership Quarterly 30 (2019) 215–232

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

The Leadership Quarterly

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/leaqua

Visualizing the landscape and evolution of leadership research☆ T

a,1 a,⁎,1 b,1 c,1
Jinlong Zhu , Lynda Jiwen Song , Li Zhu , Russell E. Johnson
a
School of Business, Renmin University of China, China
b
National School of Development, Peking University, China
c
Department of Management, Michigan State University, United States of America

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Complementing prior quantitative and qualitative reviews of the leadership literature, we conduct a bibliometric
Leadership analysis of leadership articles. Our bibliometric review provides a different perspective by portraying the
Landscape landscape and developmental trajectory of leadership research over time via co-citation and co-occurrence
Bibliometric review analyses. Using a scientific visualization tool CiteSpace and 6528 leadership works collected from the Web of
Scientific visualization
Science database from 1990 to 2017, we detect and visualize the landscape of leadership research and track how
CiteSpace
this landscape has evolved. After mapping the landscape, we discuss the insights gleaned from our bibliometric
review, with a focus on open questions, future research directions, and implications. In doing so, our review
provides readers with a systematic understanding of the development of the leadership field and a roadmap to
spark leadership research and move this literature forward.

Introduction navigate this field (Dansereau, Seitz, Chiu, Shaughnessy, & Yammarino,
2013; Day & Antonakis, 2012; Glynn & Raffaelli, 2010).
“To know where we are going with leadership research, we must know There have been several key reviews that take stock of leadership
where we are, and where we have been—we must look backward and research (e.g., Avolio, Walumbwa, & Weber, 2009; Day & Antonakis,
forward at the same time.” 2012; Dinh et al., 2014; Gardner, Lowe, Moss, Mahoney, & Cogliser,
Hunt and Dodge (2000, p. 453) 2010; Lowe & Gardner, 2000). For example, Lowe and Gardner (2000)
reviewed articles published in the Leadership Quarterly during its first
Leadership is a widely discussed and popular topic with significant
decade (1990–1999), followed by Gardner et al.'s (2010) subsequent
managerial implications (Bass & Bass, 2008; Day & Antonakis, 2012; Yukl,
review of articles published in the Leadership Quarterly during its second
2010). Over the years, leadership research has witnessed rapid growth,
decade (2000–2009). Dinh et al. (2014) conducted an extensive review
with thousands of scientific articles documenting various leadership-based
of leadership theory published in ten top-tier journals from the year 2000
phenomena and processes (Bass & Bass, 2008; Batistič, Černe, & Vogel,
to 2012. Lord, Day, Zaccaro, Avolio, and Eagly (2017) reviewed lea-
2017). Meanwhile, various theoretical streams have evolved during this
dership research in the Journal of Applied Psychology from 1917 to 2015.
time, and theoretical pluralism has characterized the field (Dinh et al.,
Although these existing reviews have been invaluable for scholars to
2014; Glynn & Raffaelli, 2010). In fact, a recent review by Meuser et al.
understand the development of the leadership field, they have primarily
(2016) identified 49 leadership theories in the published works of ten in-
relied on qualitative approaches for reviewing the content and topics of
fluential management and organizational psychology journals. The massive
the extant literature. However, further knowledge may be gleaned from
amount of literature and the diversity of theoretical approaches raise a
quantitative approaches that take stock and track the evolution of this
compelling need for stocktaking reviews that enable leadership scholars to
fast-moving literature. Recently, scholars in the broader social science

☆
We thank the Editor, David Day, and the two anonymous reviewers for your constructive feedback and helpful guidance throughout the review process.
We thank Prof. Jason Shaw, Prof. Cynthia Lee, Prof. Chaomei Chen, Prof. Jie Li, Prof. Dong Liu, Ms. Liang Hou, Mr. Guangjian Liu, Ms. Huiyue Diao, Ms. Guoyang
Zheng, Ms. Yue Wang, Ms. Danying Huang, Mr. Wei Wu, and Ms. Xueqing Fan for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this review. Our research is supported by the
National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 71372161; 71772176) and the Humanities and Social Sciences Foundation of Ministry of Education of
China (Grant No. 18YJC630277).
⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (J. Zhu), [email protected] (L.J. Song), [email protected] (L. Zhu),
[email protected] (R.E. Johnson).
1
The four authors contributed equally to this study.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.leaqua.2018.06.003
Received 6 February 2017; Received in revised form 24 June 2018; Accepted 29 June 2018
Available online 17 August 2018
1048-9843/ © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
J. Zhu et al. The Leadership Quarterly 30 (2019) 215–232

area have advanced a new method to take stock of research in scientific journals (i.e., Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management
fields. Specifically, these scholars have applied bibliometric analysis to Review, Administrative Science Quarterly, American Psychologist, Journal
quantitatively visualize the landscape and the evolution of various of Applied Psychology, Journal of Management, Leadership Quarterly,
scientific research fields (e.g., Antonakis, Bastardoz, Jacquart, & Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Organization
Shamir, 2016; Chatterjee & Sahasranamam, 2018; Chen & Guan, 2011; Science, and Personnel Psychology) that were identified in prior leader-
Liu & Gui, 2016). Our understanding of leadership research may simi- ship reviews (e.g., Dinh et al., 2014; Meuser et al., 2016).
larly benefit from quantitatively visualizing the landscape and evolu- We took three steps to build the datasets. First, in line with prior
tion of this literature. reviews used bibliometric analysis (e.g., Batistič et al., 2017), we
A quantitative visualization of the evolution of the leadership field searched for the term “leadership” in the title, abstract, or keywords.
is quite useful because it can both complement and validate what Second, we added additional records that contained other leadership-
scholars have inferred based on qualitative reviews, and it can also related terms (e.g., “leader-member exchange”, “abusive supervision”,
quantitatively demonstrate the ways in which the leadership field is and “followership”) in the title, abstract, or keywords. We extracted
evolving (Kozlowski, Chen, & Salas, 2017; Nerur, Rasheed, & Natarajan, these records in a text file. Third, we looked through the title, abstract,
2008). Compared with a qualitative review, in this quantitative review, and keywords of each record and eliminated those records (e.g., book
we can detect the landscape and development of the leadership field reviews, research on price leadership) that do not report theoretical or
and provide a general overview objectively and visually. Moreover, empirical research on leadership in organizations (Meuser et al., 2016).
recent advancements in visualization tools such as CiteSpace (Chen, These three steps produced a total of 6528 records of original leader-
2006) provide a quantitatively rigorous tool to visualize the landscape ship research that were published between January 1990 and June
and evolutionary patterns of leadership research using big data. As 2017.
such, a quantitative review that visualizes the landscape and evolution Our primary sample is comprised of 6528 records. From these 6528
of leadership research is both important and timely. records, we generated 180,630 secondary documents, which are the
In this review, we seek to quantitatively portray the landscape and references cited by the 6528 primary documents (Batistič et al., 2017;
developmental trajectory of leadership research and detect new re- Chen, 2006). Table 1 presents the definitions and functions of technical
search frontiers and emerging trends in the leadership literature. We terms (e.g., primary sample, secondary document, co-citation, and co-
review 28 years of published research (from January 1990 to June occurrence) we use in this review.
2017) from the Web of Science database. Using the visualization tool
CiteSpace, we detect, quantify, and visualize the landscape and evolu- Analytical method
tion of leadership research. Furthermore, based on the results of our
quantitative review, we provide a roadmap for future leadership re- We use co-citation analysis (Chen, 2006; Nerur et al., 2008; Tsai & Wu,
search. 2010) provided by CiteSpace to identify and visualize the landscape and
Our bibliometric review contributes to the leadership literature in evolutional patterns of leadership research. Co-citation happens when
several ways. First, our study offers a new way of looking at leadership two earlier documents are cited in a new work simultaneously (i.e., two
areas and their associations by examining co-citations and co-occur- earlier documents appear in the reference list of the new work) (Small,
rence data. To achieve this, we utilize a bibliometric approach to take 1973; Vanraan, 1990). While a citation indicates that there is a re-
stock of leadership research and visualize the landscape of leadership lationship (e.g., giving credit for related work) between the cited and
research. Second, we quantitatively trace the evolution of leadership citing documents (Egghe & Rousseau, 1990), co-citation indicates that
and underlying theories from 1990 to 2017. For example, our review there is a relationship between two cited documents (Small, 1973). Small
can show how frontiers of leadership research change over time. Third, (1973) states that cited documents are linked together through the pro-
we link our analyses of evolution with comprehensive future research cess of co-citation. The total cited documents reflect the overall knowl-
agendas, which may help spawn new streams of leadership research. edge base of the literature on a speciality (Small, 1973). A co-citation
Thus, this review can help readers to understand research frontiers and network reflects the relationships among the cited documents (i.e.,
emerging trends of leadership research. In sum, our review catalyzes knowledge base). While a document can be cited across multiple dis-
future leadership research by providing scholars with a clear and sys- ciplines, co-citation analysis focuses on the extent to which the document
tematic understanding of the current intellectual landscape, research is co-cited with other documents by citing documents in a research field
frontiers and emerging trends, as well as a roadmap to push leadership (i.e., primary documents). Thus, documents with high co-citation fre-
research forward. quencies with other documents (i.e., highly co-cited documents) are at the
heart of the knowledge base of a research field and can be regarded as the
Bibliometric method landmark documents of the field (Chen, 2006; Small, 1973).
More specifically, we use co-citation analysis to provide a document
The method applied in this review is bibliometric mapping (Chen, co-citation network, an author co-citation network and a journal co-citation
2006; Cobo, López-Herrera, Herrera-Viedma, & Herrera, 2011), which network. A document co-citation network, which can also be called a re-
is a visual technique that can quantitatively display the landscape and ference co-citation network, reflects the frequency with which two works
dynamic aspects of a knowledge domain (Börner, Chen, & Boyack, are both cited in the same primary document and shows the salient
2003; Liu & Gui, 2016). In line with prior research (e.g., Batistič et al., network of co-cited references (Small, 1973). For example, Graen and
2017), we collected data from the Web of Science core citation data- Uhl-Bien (1995) cited both Bass (1990) and Burns (1978). Thus a
base. The analysis tool used in this study is CiteSpace, which is a Java- document co-citation network is established with the nodes of Bass
based scientific visualization software developed by Chaomei Chen at (1990) and Burns (1978). Then we use the document co-citation net-
Drexel University (Chen, 2006). work to trace major co-citation work as landmarks and the evolvement
of frontiers of research over time. Complementing the document co-ci-
Sample tation network, the author co-citation network reflects authors whose
works are cited in the same primary document (Nerur et al., 2008).
In this article, we review leadership research from 1990 to 2017 Similarly, we depict the journal co-citation network.
from the Web of Science database, and we collect leadership research in In addition, we use co-occurrence analysis to calculate the frequency of
four research areas (i.e., management, business, organizational psy- pairs of keywords appearing in the same document (He, 1999; Liu, Yin,
chology, and social psychology). The choice of these four research areas Liu, & Dunford, 2015). The analysis of co-occurrence is typically depicted
is based on the analysis of the research areas of 10 influential leadership as a network of concepts (Chen, 2013). The time-zone visualization graph

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Table 1
Main technical terms in this review.
Technical terms Definition Explanation or function

Primary document The selected documents (citing document) Explanation:

6528 original leadership research documents as citing works in this
research.
Secondary document The cited references by selected documents (cited documents) Explanation:
180,630 secondary documents as cited works in the primary
documents.
Citation “If paper R contains a bibliographic note using and describing paper C, then C has Function:
a citation from R” (Egghe & Rousseau, 1990: 204). Represent the key concepts, methods, or experiments in a field with
frequently cited papers (Small, 1973).
Co-citation “Documents are co-cited if they appear in the same document reference list, thus Functions:
co-citation shows a similarity relationship between two cited publications 1) Identify landmark works that reflect literature structure with high
(secondary document) that appear in the same citing document (primary total co-citation (Tsai & Wu, 2010);
document)” (Batistič et al., 2017: 89). 2) Map out the relationships between key ideas in a field (Small,
“A new form of document coupling, co-citation is defined as the frequency with 1973);
which two documents are cited together” (Small, 1973: 265). 3) Model the intellectual structure of scientific specialities
objectively (Small, 1973);
4) Provide clues to understand mechanisms of speciality
development (Small, 1973).
Co-occurrence “Co-occurrence analysis is based on the assumption that when two items appear in Functions:
the same context, they are related to some degree. It tends to be employed to 1) “Measure the frequency of co-occurrence of pairs of keywords or
explore changes in research themes in a research field by measuring the frequency noun phrases and other terms in the same document” (Liu et al.,
of pairs of items (i.e., words or noun phrases) occurring in the entire body of 2015: 139);
literature in a selected field” (Liu et al., 2015: 139). 2) “Study disciplines are involved in constructing the intellectual
base of a specific research field” (Liu et al., 2015: 139);
3) Monitor evolving research frontiers of specific themes over time
(Liu et al., 2015);
4) Detect major topics and intellectual base of a specific research
field (Liu et al., 2015).
Burst Burst is defined by Kleinberg's burst detection algorithm (Kleinberg, 2003), which Functions:
can be adapted for the sharp increase of keywords or reference in a specific area. 1) Find emerging trends and radical changes (Chen, 2006);
In Citespace software, current research frontiers are identified based on such burst 2) Detect sharp increases of interest in a speciality (Chen, 2006);
terms (Chen, 2006). 3) Identify emergent terms (e.g., authors/keywords) (Chen, 2006).

Note. Interested readers can refer to Li & Chen (2016) for the generation process of the co-citation network (p. 144) and the generation process of the co-occurrence
network (p. 201). The English version of the generation processes from the original chapters (in Chinese) are available upon request from our corresponding author.

delineates the focal topics in each time slice and how those major topics Document co-citation analyses
evolved. The difference between co-citation and co-occurrence is that the
former performs the calculation of the reference part of the primary The document co-citation network is the network of co-cited refer-
paper, while the latter focuses on the front end, specifically, the keywords ences (Liu et al., 2015; Small, 1973). When reference A and reference B
section of the primary paper. For example, keyword co-occurrence is are cited in the same primary document, reference A and reference B
defined as two keywords occur in the same document. The dataset used in have a co-citation link. The co-citation frequency of reference A and
this analysis is the 6528 records of original leadership research. A co- reference B is calculated based on the frequency with which the two
citation is the relationship between two cited references (which are cited references are cited together in the primary documents (Chen, 2006;
by the same citing document), the dataset used in the co-citation analysis Liu et al., 2015; Small, 1973).
are 180,630 secondary documents (cited-reference) co-cited by the 6528 We conduct a document co-citation analysis to detect the landscape
records of original leadership research. and paradigm development of the leadership research field (Chen,
2006; Ramos-Rodríguez & Ruíz-Navarro, 2004). The document co-cita-
Bibliometric analyses and results tion network of leadership research based on seven four-year slices
(1990–2017) is shown in Fig. 2. For each four-year slice, the CiteSpace
Author co-citation analyses software selected top 100 most cited references. If a reference was one
of the top 100 most-cited references in at least one of the seven four-
The author co-citation network is the network of co-cited authors year slices, the reference was included in the reference co-citation
(White & Griffith, 1981). When author A and author B are cited in the network as a node (Chen, 2006; Li & Chen, 2016). The document co-
same primary document, author A and author B have a co-citation link. citation network in Fig. 2 shows only the most co-cited works. In the
The co-citation frequency of author A and author B is calculated based network, each node represents one reference, and edges represent the
on the frequency with which the two authors are cited together in the co-citations of two references. The sizes of these nodes are in proportion
primary documents (Liu & Chen, 2012; Small, 1973; Tsay, Xu, & Wu, to their document co-citation frequency (Antonakis et al., 2016). For
2003). Shown in Fig. 1 is the author co-citation network of leadership example, Judge and Piccolo's (2004) meta-analysis of transformational,
research based on seven four-year slices (1990–2017). The author co- transactional, and laissez-faire leadership has the largest size of the
citation network shows only the most co-cited authors in Fig. 1. In the node, which is identified as the most co-cited reference. The links
network, each node represents one author and edges represent the co- among the nodes mean that the papers are co-cited in the literature.
citation relationship of two authors. The sizes of these authors' nodes
are in proportion to their author co-citation frequency (Antonakis et al., Analysis of 200 landmark leadership works
2016). The results in Fig. 1 indicate that Bernard Bass, Gary Yukl, Bruce
Avolio, Robert J. House, and Timothy Judge emerge as the top 5 most Articles or books with high total co-citation frequency are landmark
influential authors in the author co-citation network. works in the literature (Tsai & Wu, 2010). Based on the index of co-

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J. Zhu et al. The Leadership Quarterly 30 (2019) 215–232

Fig. 1. Author co-citation network of leadership research during 1990–2017.

Note. The author co-citation network shows only the most co-cited authors. Each node represents one author and edges represent the co-citation relationship of two
authors. Difference in node size indicates relative difference in author co-citation frequency. We deleted Steve W.J. Kozlowski, Philip M. Podsakoff, Kristopher J.
Preacher, Andrew F. Hayes, Paul E. Spector, and Paul D. Bliese, whose works cited in the leadership literature are mainly methodological papers.

Fig. 2. Document co-citation network of leadership research during 1990–2017.

Note. The document co-citation network shows only the most co-cited works. Each node represents one reference (only first authors are named), and edges represent
the co-citations of two references. Difference in node size indicates relative difference in document co-citation frequency. Similar as in Fig. 1, we deleted metho-
dological articles that are not leadership research papers.

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J. Zhu et al. The Leadership Quarterly 30 (2019) 215–232

Table 2
Analysis of 200 influential leadership works during 1990–2017.
Leadership themes Number of Sample references Frequency Burst Major overarching theories
articles index index

Leadership in general 16 Avolio et al. (2009) 169 22.4

Avolio (2007) 70 17.2
*Dinh et al. (2014) 51 22.1
House and Aditya (1997) 45 24.0
Mumford, Scott, Gaddis, and 40 19.2
Strange (2002)
Yammarino et al. (2005) 77 21.7
Yukl (2010) 42 25.5
Transformational and 82 Bass and Bass (2008) 139 25.3 Social cognitive theory; social exchange theory; social identity
charismatic leadership Bass and Riggio (2006) 137 31.9 theory; job characteristics theory; goal setting theory; trait activation
Bass, Avolio, Jung, and Berson 80 30.8 theory; upper echelons theory.
(2003)
Bono and Ilies (2006) 49 23.5
Bono and Judge (2004) 71 24.0
*Braun, Peus, Weisweiler, 25 10.0
and Frey (2013)
Conger and Kanungo (1998) 74 37.6
Gardner and Avolio (1998) 50 26.0
Gong et al. (2009) 96 15.5
Howell and Shamir (2005) 81 23.1
Judge and Piccolo (2004) 189 67.0
Kark, Shamir, and Chen (2003) 66 25.4
Kirkman et al. (2009) 100 18.8
Lowe et al. (1996) 75 40.9
Piccolo and Colquitt (2006) 119 27.7
*Pieterse, van Knippenberg, 35 14.0
Schippers, and Stam (2010)
Shamir, House, and Arthur 48 27.1
(1993)
*Tims et al. (2011) 34 13.6
*van Knippenberg and Sitkin 97 39.1
(2013)
*Wang and Howell (2010) 34 13.6
Wang et al. (2005) 87 26.6
*Wang, Oh, Courtright, and 77 31.0
Colbert (2011)
*Wu et al. (2010) 44 17.7
Transactional leadership 22 Avolio, Bass, and Jung (1999) 61 33.0 Social learning theory; social cognitive theory; upper echelons theory.
Bass et al. (2003) 80 30.8
Howell and Avolio (1993) 55 30.8
Judge and Piccolo (2004) 189 67.0
Lowe et al. (1996) 75 40.9
Leader-member exchange 10 *Dulebohn et al. (2012) 68 27.4 Social exchange theory; network theory; open system theory; social
Gerstner and Day (1997) 31 16.0 cognitive theory.
Graen and Uhl-Bien (1995) 42 21.8
Liao, Liu, and Loi (2010) 26 10.4
Uhl-Bien (2006) 53 21.3
Wang et al. (2005) 87 26.6
Ethical/Moral leadership 16 *Avey, Palanski, and 26 10.4 Social exchange theory; social learning theory; cognitive moral
Walumbwa (2011) development theory; social information processing theory;
*Brown and Mitchell (2010) 38 15.2 conservation of resources theory; affective events theory; social
Brown and Treviño (2006) 157 37.3 cognitive theory; social identity theory; upper echelons theory; self-
Brown et al. (2005) 151 45.3 regulation theory; theory of moral reasoning; moral development
*Kacmar, Bachrach, Harris, 26 10.6 theory; theory of moral judgment; behavioral plasticity theory.
and Zivnuska (2011)
*Kalshoven et al. (2011) 38 15.2
*Mayer et al. (2012) 70 28.2
Mayer et al. (2009) 180 25.6
*Piccolo, Greenbaum, 80 15.1
Hartog, and Folger (2010)
*Schaubroeck et al. (2012) 50 20.1
Authentic leadership 9 Avolio and Gardner (2005) 110 33.3 Self-determination theory; social exchange theory; role incongruity
Avolio, Gardner, et al. (2004) 65 20.2 theory; social exchange theory; self-determination theory; social
Gardner et al. (2005) 77 23.0 identity theory; self-discrepancy theory; social learning theory;
*Gardner et al. (2011) 50 20.1 affective events theory.
Walumbwa, Avolio, Gardner, 167 28.3
et al. (2008)
Servant leadership 6 Liden et al. (2008) 97 19.3 Social exchange theory; social learning theory; regulatory focus
*van Dierendonck (2011) 65 26.1 theory; social cognitive theory; self-determination theory; goal setting
*Walumbwa et al. (2010) 46 18.5 theory.
(continued on next page)

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Table 2 (continued)

Leadership themes Number of Sample references Frequency Burst Major overarching theories
articles index index

Abusive supervision (include 20 Aryee et al. (2007) 101 22.7 Social exchange theory; reactance theory; power/dependence theory;
destructive leadership) *Lian, Ferris, and Brown 30 12.0 moral exclusion theory; social learning theory; social information
(2012) processing theory; attribution theory; role theory; conservation of
*Liu, Liao, and Loi (2012) 38 – resources theory; self-gain view; self-regulation impairment view;
*Martinko et al. (2013) 32 14.2 demand-control theory of stress.
*Mawritz, Mayer, Hoobler, 38 15.2
Wayne, and Marinova (2012)
Mitchell and Ambrose (2007) 96 21.6
*Restubog, Scott, and 29 11.6
Zagenczyk (2011)
*Schyns and Schilling (2013) 37 14.8
Tepper (2007) 127 28.6
Tepper et al. (2006) 49 19.7
Tepper, Henle, Lambert, 66 12.1
Giacalone, and Duffy (2008)
*Tepper et al. (2011) 42 16.9
*Thau and Mitchell (2010) 27 10.8
Team leadership and shared 15 Burke et al. (2006) 39 15.7 Functional leadership theory; goal setting theory; socio-technical
leadership Carson et al. (2007) 93 20.9 systems theory; self-control theory; social learning theory; expectancy
Day et al. (2004) 28 13.6 theory; path-goal theory; equity theory; reinforcement theory; social
Ensley et al. (2006) 35 14.1 cognitive theory; upper echelons theory.
*Morgeson et al. (2010) 102 14.4
Pearce and Conger (2003) 50 21.7
Zaccaro, Rittman, and Marks 21 11.5
(2001)
Trait theory 11 Bono and Judge (2004) 71 24.0 Trait activation theory; leadership categorization theory; social
*DeRue et al. (2011) 119 26.2 exchange theory; socio-analytic theory; role theory; theory of core
Judge, Bono, Ilies, and 49 23.5 evaluations; goal-setting theory; expectancy theory; self-efficacy
Gerhardt (2002) theory.
Judge et al. (2009) 64 8.7
*Koenig et al. (2011) 52 20.9
Zaccaro (2007) 30 12.0
Strategic leadership 6 Finkelstein and Hambrick 24 12.6 Upper echelons theory.
(1996)
Jansen et al. (2009) 39 15.6
Resick et al. (2009) 31 12.4
Waldman et al. (2001) 44 19.9
Empowering leadership 4 Ahearne, Mathieu, and Rapp 28 11.2 Role identity theory.
(2005)
Srivastava et al. (2006) 32 12.9
*Zhang and Bartol (2010) 115 –
Self-sacrificing leadership 1 van Knippenberg and van 58 15.6 Social categorization theory.
Knippenberg (2005)
Leadership emergence & 6 Avolio and Gardner (2005) 110 33.3 Social exchange theory; self-determination theory; social identity
development Day and Harrison (2007) 25 10.1 theory.
Day (2001) 35 15.8
*DeRue and Ashford (2010) 80 12.2
Gardner et al. (2005) 77 23.0
Kark and Van Dijk (2007) 29 11.6
Implicit leadership 7 Den Hartog et al. (1999) 30 16.7 Social identity theory.
*van Knippenberg (2011) 65 26.1
van Knippenberg and van 58 15.6
Knippenberg (2005)
Followership 5 Collinson (2006) 27 10.8 Self-identity theory; social exchange theory; self-determination
Gardner et al. (2005) 77 23.0 theory.
Howell and Shamir (2005) 81 23.1
Identity-based leadership 5 *DeRue and Ashford (2010) 80 12.2 Social identity theory.
theory *Haslam, Reicher, and 27 10.8
Platow (2011)
Hogg (2001) 45 20.9
Emotions and leadership 5 Bono and Ilies (2006) 58 16.3 Affective events theory; social identity theory.
Dasborough and Ashkanasy 23 12.6
(2002)
Sy et al. (2005) 56 14.9
Diversity and cross-cultural 5 Eagly and Karau (2002) 36 17.3 Role theory (role congruity theory); value/belief theory of culture;
leadership House et al. (2004) 132 45.0 implicit motivation theory; the integrated theory; structural
Javidan and House (2006) 26 10.4 contingency theory.
Complexity leadership 1 Uhl-Bien et al. (2007) 61 13.7
Paternalistic leadership 1 Pellegrini and Scandura (2008) 60 11.3
Paradoxical/ambidextrous 1 *Rosing et al. (2011) 37 15.9 Path-goal theory.
leadership

Note. Some papers employ multiple leadership frameworks and thus they could be included in more than one leadership theme. We referred to Dinh et al. (2014) and
Meuser et al. (2016) to name the leadership theories. We did not summarize the overarching theories for the “Leadership in General” category, because these studies
did not focus on a specific leadership theme. The sample references were selected subjectively, where we jointly considered the frequency index, and burst index, as
well as the content of the reference. Papers published since 2010 are noted with a marker *.
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citation frequency (Liu & Chen, 2012; Small, 1973; Tsay et al., 2003), Sitkin, 2013) and evaluate the conceptual weaknesses in transformational
we identify 200 influential leadership works from 1990 to 2017. Ana- and charismatic leadership theories (Yukl, 1999).
lyzing the content and major contributions of these landmark works
provides us with an understanding of the landscape of leadership re- Leader-member exchange and relational leadership theories
search. Ten out of the 200 landmark leadership works are about leader-
Next, we provide a summary of the 200 landmark leadership works member exchange (LMX) theory, which focuses on the dyadic re-
in Table 2. We organize our summary based on the major themes of lationship between a leader and a follower (Gerstner & Day, 1997).
leadership research as follows. LMX was another important leadership theme during the 1990s and
beyond. In the 1990s, Graen and Uhl-Bien (1995), one of the most in-
An integrative review of leadership research fluential LMX studies, discuss LMX as a relationship-based approach to
Among the 200 landmark leadership works, 16 papers or books pro- leadership and apply a multi-level perspective to review the develop-
vide integrative reviews of leadership research in general. For example, ment of LMX theory over 25 years. Gerstner and Day (1997) provide a
Avolio et al.'s (2009) review paper entitled “Leadership: Current theories, meta-analytic review of LMX theory, with a focus on correlates and
research, and future directions” is one of the landmark works. This review construct issues. Schriesheim, Castro, and Cogliser (1999) provide an-
paper describes the development of 13 major leadership theories and other comprehensive review on LMX research, with a focus on theory,
provides some directions to move these leadership theories forward. Dinh measurement, and data-analytic practices.
et al.'s (2014) review paper entitled “Leadership theory and research in In the last two decades, scholars have enriched LMX research re-
the new millennium: Current theoretical trends and changing perspec- garding its antecedents and outcomes. Ilies, Nahrgang, and Morgeson
tives” is another landmark leadership article. This article takes stock of (2007) conducted a meta-analysis of the relationship between LMX and
established and developing theories since 2000 and provides a process- organizational citizenship behavior. Dulebohn, Bommer, Liden, Brouer,
oriented framework to integrate diverse leadership theories. Yammarino, and Ferris (2012) provided an updated meta-analysis of antecedents
Dionne, Chun, and Dansereau's (2005) paper entitled “Leadership and and consequences of LMX as well as directions for future research.
levels of analysis: A state-of-the-science review” presents a comprehensive Moreover, scholars have examined LMX as a mediator or moderator.
review of the leadership literature with a focus on levels of analysis issues. For example, LMX has been found to mediate the relationship between
It is noteworthy that, the book entitled “Leadership in organizations” by transformational leadership with organizational citizenship behavior
Yukl (2010) also offers a synthesis of leadership research and has had a (Wang et al., 2005). Finally, another landmark leadership article is Uhl-
significant impact on leadership research. Bien's (2006) treatise on relational leadership theory, exploring the
emerging and changing social processes of leadership during inter-
Transformational and charismatic leadership theories personal interactions.
Consistent with the findings of Lord et al. (2017), our results suggest
that transformational and charismatic leadership topics represent a Value-based forms of leadership
major stream of leadership research over the past three decades. Our During the 1990s and beyond, we witness a growth of research on
review indicates that 82 out of the 200 landmark leadership works are value-based leadership including ethical leadership, authentic leader-
about transformational or charismatic leadership. Among these re- ship, and servant leadership (Hernandez, Eberly, Avolio, & Johnson,
search works, the focus is either on transformational leadership or 2011). In line with this observation, 31 out of the 200 landmark lea-
charismatic leadership, and in some instances, transformational lea- dership articles fall into the value-based stream of leadership. Among
dership and charismatic leadership are mentioned together. Relatedly, these works, some scholars provide a review of ethical leadership
some works are on transactional leadership and self-sacrificing lea- (Brown & Treviño, 2006), authentic leadership (Gardner, Cogliser,
dership. Below, we summarize how these studies advance neocharis- Davis, & Dickens, 2011), or servant leadership (van Dierendonck,
matic leadership theories (Dinh et al., 2014) in five key aspects. 2011). Some studies develop and validate new measures for ethical
First, several books or papers provide qualitative reviews. For ex- leadership (Kalshoven, Den Hartog, & De Hoogh, 2011), authentic
ample, Bass and Riggio (2006), and Bass and Bass (2008) provide a leadership (Walumbwa, Avolio, Gardner, Wernsing, & Peterson, 2008)
synthesis of the transformational leadership theory. Conger and Kanungo or servant leadership (Liden, Wayne, Zhao, & Henderson, 2008). Some
(1998) present a systematic introduction to charismatic leadership theory. studies advance our understanding of the influence mechanisms of
Second, several studies take stock of knowledge using meta-analysis. For ethical leadership (Walumbwa et al., 2011), authentic leadership
example, Judge and Piccolo (2004) provides a meta-analytic test of the (Avolio, Gardner, Walumbwa, Luthans, & May, 2004), or servant lea-
relative validity of the full range of transformational, transactional, and dership (Walumbwa, Hartnell, & Oke, 2010). Also, some studies test
laissez-faire leadership. Bono and Judge (2004) provide a meta-analysis trickle-down models of ethical leadership (e.g., Mayer, Kuenzi,
of personality and transformational and transactional leadership. Lowe, Greenbaum, Bardes, & Salvador, 2009).
Kroeck, and Sivasubramaniam (1996) provide a meta-analytic review of
the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire literature. Third, several studies Abusive supervision
advance transformational leadership research by identifying new med- Abusive supervision has received substantial attention since the
iating mechanisms such as leader-member exchange (Wang, Law, 2000s. Twenty out of the 200 landmark leadership articles are about
Hackett, Wang, & Chen, 2005), employee creative self-efficacy (Gong, abusive supervision. An impactful work is Tepper's (2007) review of
Huang, & Farh, 2009), perceptions of job characteristics (Piccolo & abusive supervision in work organizations, which articulates the con-
Colquitt, 2006), self-concordant goals (Bono & Judge, 2003), trust ceptualization of abusive supervision, develops an emergent model that
(Schaubroeck, Lam, & Peng, 2011), identification (Walumbwa, Avolio, & integrates extant empirical work, and suggests directions for future
Zhu, 2008), psychological empowerment (Avolio, Zhu, Koh, & Bhatia, research. Aryee, Chen, Sun, and Debrah (2007) investigate the main
2004). Along similar lines, other studies highlight new moderators that and interactive effects of supervisor perceptions of interactional justice
constrain the effects of leadership, such as power distance orientation and an authoritarian leadership style on abusive supervision and ex-
(Kirkman, Chen, Farh, Chen, & Lowe, 2009) and support for innovation amine the relative importance of procedural and interactional justice as
(Howell & Avolio, 1993). Fourth, some studies advance transformational mediators of the relationship between abusive supervision and the
leadership from a multi-level or cross-level perspective (e.g., Kirkman outcomes of citizenship behavior and organizational commitment.
et al., 2009), or a within-person perspective (Tims, Bakker, & Mitchell and Ambrose (2007) examine the moderating effects of ne-
Xanthopoulou, 2011). Last, some studies provide a critical assessment of gative reciprocity beliefs in the relationship of abusive supervision with
charismatic–transformational leadership research (van Knippenberg & subordinates' organization deviance. Drawing on power-dependence

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theory, Tepper et al. (2009) investigate the moderating effect of in- Leadership emergence and development
tention to quit in the relationship of abusive supervision with sub- The development of effective leaders and leadership behavior has
ordinates' workplace deviance. Tepper, Moss, and Duffy (2011) find received considerable attention from practitioners and also from re-
that relationship conflict and poor subordinate performance mediates searchers (Avolio & Gardner, 2005; Day, 2001; Day, Fleenor, Atwater,
the relationship of perceived deep-level dissimilarity with abusive su- Sturm, & Mckee, 2014). Day (2001) reviews how leadership develop-
pervision. Drawing on social learning theory and social information ment is being conducted in the practice context and summarizes re-
processing theory, Mawritz and colleagues (2013) test a trickle-down search on leadership development in the research context. Gardner,
model of abusive supervision across three hierarchical levels (i.e., Avolio, Luthans, May, and Walumbwa (2005) develop a self-based
managers, supervisors, and employees). Martinko, Harvey, Brees, and model of authentic leader and follower development. The model em-
Mackey (2013) distinguish abusive supervisory behavior with abusive phasizes the developmental processes of leader and follower self-
supervisory perceptions. awareness and self-regulation. DeRue and Ashford (2010) develop a
social process model of leadership identity construction.
Team leadership
Fifteen out of the 200 landmark leadership articles investigate lea-
Followership
dership in the team context. Some of these studies investigate individual
In contrast with a leader-centric perspective on leadership, some
leadership theories such as transformational leadership (e.g., Eisenbeiss,
scholars have begun to examine the perspective of followers (Uhl-Bien,
van Knippenberg, & Boerner, 2008; Wang & Howell, 2010; Wu, Tsui, &
Riggio, Lowe, & Carsten, 2014). Noteworthy, Howell and Shamir
Kinicki, 2010) and ethical leadership (Mayer, Aquino, Greenbaum, &
(2005) discuss the role of followers in the charismatic leadership pro-
Kuenzi, 2012) in teams. Other studies investigate collective forms of lea-
cess. They distinguish between two types of charismatic relation-
dership, such as shared leadership. In particular, Pearce and Conger
ships—personalized and socialized—and present general propositions
(2003) depict the historical underpinnings of shared leadership and pro-
about how followers' self-concepts might determine the type of char-
vide a classic conceptualization of shared leadership. Carson, Tesluk, and
ismatic relationships that they form with a leader.
Marrone (2007) investigate the antecedents of shared leadership and its
consequences on team performance as well as provide a social network
approach to measure shared leadership. Also noteworthy, Morgeson, Identity-based leadership theories
DeRue, and Karam (2010) advance a functional approach to under- This leadership theme includes self-concept and social identity ap-
standing leadership structures and processes in teams. Burke et al. (2006) proaches to leadership (e.g., Jackson & Johnson, 2012; Lord, Brown, &
provide a meta-analysis of what types of leadership behaviors are func- Freiberg, 1999; van Knippenberg, van Knippenberg, De Cremer, &
tional in teams. Day, Gronn, and Salas (2004) set up an emerging IMOI Hogg, 2004). In a seminal work, Hogg (2001) describes a social identity
(inputs, mediators, outcomes, inputs) framework for understanding the theory of leadership whereby a leader's social influence derives from
development of team leadership capacity. him/her closely aligning with the group prototype. DeRue and Ashford
(2010) further advance this line of research by articulating a social
Trait theories process of leadership identity construction in organizations.
Historically, trait approaches to leadership is a classic leadership
paradigm. During the 1990s and beyond, some landmark articles con- Emotions and leadership
ducted meta-analyses on the relationship of leadership behaviors or As a nascent approach to leadership research (Dinh et al., 2014),
styles with various traits or dispositions, such as the five-factor model of leaders' and followers' emotions are receiving increased attention (Bono
personality (Bono & Judge, 2004; Judge & Bono, 2000), intelligence & Ilies, 2006; Connelly & Gooty, 2015; Liu, Song, Li, & Liao, 2017; van
(Judge, Colbert, & Ilies, 2004), and masculinity (Koenig, Eagly, Kleef et al., 2009). One landmark work by Sy, Côté, and Saavedra
Mitchell, & Ristikari, 2011). DeRue, Nahrgang, Wellman, and (2005), investigates the impact of the leader's mood on the mood of
Humphrey (2011) provide a meta-analytic test of the relative validity of group members, group affective tone, and group processes.
leader traits and behaviors, finding that behaviors are more proximal
(and thus more influential) to outcomes (e.g., group performance, sa-
Diversity and cross-cultural leadership
tisfaction with leader) than traits.
Diversity and cross-cultural leadership is an emerging theme which
is attracting wide attention. An important milestone in cross-cultural
Strategic leadership
leadership research is the GLOBE (Global Leadership and
Strategic leadership analyzes the leadership of the CEO or other top
Organizational Behavior Effectiveness) project (House et al., 1999;
leaders or top management teams at the highest level of an organiza-
House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman, & Gupta, 2004; Javidan & House,
tion. Finkelstein and Hambrick (1996) provide a systematic introduc-
2006). In the book entitled “Culture, leadership, and organizations: The
tion to strategic leadership. Jansen, Vera, and Crossan (2009) in-
GLOBE study of 62 societies,” House et al. (2004) detail their systematic
vestigate the effects of strategic leadership on organizational
investigation of leadership across different cultures. An important
innovation. Waldman, Ramírez, House, and Puranam (2001) in-
finding of the GLOBE project is that leadership attributes and behaviors
vestigate the relationship between CEO leadership attributes and or-
differ across cultures, yet certain implicit leadership theories (e.g.,
ganizational profitability. Resick, Whitman, Weingarden, and Hiller
charismatic-transformational leadership) appear to be universally en-
(2009) discuss the bright side and the dark side of CEO personality.
dorsed.
Empowering and participative leadership
In the 1990s, empowering or participative leadership theories began Other nascent leadership themes
to receive increasing attention. One landmark leadership article is As shown in Table 2, studies on complexity leadership, paternalistic
Zhang and Bartol's (2010) paper on empowering leadership. In this leadership, and paradoxical leadership also have high co-citation fre-
paper, Zhang and Bartol link empowering leadership to employee quency. Among the landmark works, Pellegrini and Scandura (2008)
creativity and examine the influence process through psychological provide a review of research on paternalistic leadership. Uhl-Bien,
empowerment, intrinsic motivation, and creative process engagement. Marion, and McKelvey (2007) offer a systematic introduction to com-
Another landmark paper is by Srivastava, Bartol, and Locke (2006), plexity leadership theory. Rosing, Frese, and Bausch (2011) use ambi-
which links empowering leadership to team performance and examines dextrous leadership to explain the heterogeneity of the leadership-in-
the mediating process through knowledge sharing and efficacy. novation relationship.

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General findings from document co-citation analysis development. This reveals that scholars have drawn increased attention
In general, we observe the following trajectories and trends for to the role of the follower in constructing leader and leadership con-
landmark leadership research. First, in the 1990s, most of the landmark cepts. Abusive supervision is unique and relatively independent of other
documents concerned transformational and charismatic leadership. In leadership concepts except as it co-occurs with ethical leadership, re-
the 2000s, more landmark articles involved social exchange theory and flecting the fact that a negative type of leadership is gaining more at-
leadership in teams. From 2010 to 2017, leadership scholars' interest tention in the literature independently.
spread to value-based leadership (e.g., servant leadership, ethical lea- Using this figure as a guide, there may be novel ways of examining
dership, and authentic leadership), shared leadership, and the emer- relationships among “distal knots” in the leadership map, such as be-
gence of abusive supervision and followership research. Second, we tween abusive supervision and ethical or servant leadership (cf. Lin,
find that the major contributions of these landmark documents include Ma, & Johnson, 2016) or between shared leadership and leadership
refining the understanding of important leadership theories, such as development and identity (cf. Day & Harrison, 2007).
transformational leadership (e.g., Judge et al., 2004), abusive super-
vision (Zellars, Tepper, & Duffy, 2002), and authentic leadership Journal co-citation analysis
(Gardner et al., 2011), linking leadership to novel outcomes such as
creativity (Zhang & Bartol, 2010), introducing new theories or per- Journal co-citation means that two journals are cited in one docu-
spectives to understand how leadership influences work outcomes (e.g., ment, which often reflects the relations among journals and the dis-
Bono & Judge, 2003; Graen & Uhl-Bien, 1995), and extending leader- tribution of knowledge bases. Displayed in Fig. 4 is the co-citation net-
ship research from the individual level of analysis to higher levels of work of the most-cited journals that publish leadership research. Each
analysis (e.g., dyads, teams; Yammarino & Dubinsky, 1992). Finally, we node represents a journal and edges represent the co-citations relationship
find that nearly half of the landmark documents are published in the of two journals. As indicated in Fig. 4, the top ten influential journals in
Journal of Applied Psychology, The Leadership Quarterly, and Academy of leadership research include Journal of Applied Psychology, Leadership
Management Journal, suggesting that these three journals have played a Quarterly, Academy of Management Journal, Academy of Management Re-
critical role in the development of leadership research. In the following, view, Journal of Management, Administrative Science Quarterly, Organiza-
we include Fig. 3 and Fig. 4 to demonstrate inter-relationship of lea- tional Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Personality and
dership theories and to indicate the journal co-citation network of Social Psychology, Journal of Organizational Behavior, and Human Relations.
leadership research during 1990 to 2017.
Keyword co-occurrence analysis
The inter-relationship among leadership theories
Considering the relationships between leadership theories is very We use keyword co-occurrence analysis (He, 1999; Liu et al., 2015)
important. Thus we code the 200 landmark leadership articles as focal provided by CiteSpace to monitor evolving research frontiers of lea-
leadership phenomena. As shown in Fig. 3, we can see that transfor- dership themes over time.
mational leadership is at the heart of the network map. The lines are As shown in Fig. 5, the time-zone visualization graph is a time-zone
thicker between the constructs of transformational leadership, trans- view of keyword co-occurrence on leadership (1990–2017). The time-
actional leadership, charismatic leadership, and trait theories, which zone view represents each time-slice by arraying vertical strips from left
means that these leadership theories have a high level of co-occurrence, to right to show the evolution of keywords (Chen, 2006). We list lea-
as seen in the leadership network map. Several leadership styles (i.e., dership-related nodes with high co-occurrence frequency in Fig. 5.
transformational leadership, transactional leadership, charismatic lea- These nodes with high co-occurrence frequencies represent major topics
dership, strategic leadership, and ethical leadership) are linked with in leadership research during the period. Some high-frequency key-
each other and have close ties to trait theories at the same time. Most of words emerging recently are meaningful for detecting potential new
these trait theory-related articles are meta-analyses or review works research frontiers in the field (e.g., abusive supervision, servant lea-
(e.g., Bono & Judge, 2004; Judge, Piccolo, & Kosalka, 2009). It is also dership, authentic leadership, and followership). In Fig. 5, both the size
interesting to find that followership co-occurs with team leadership and of the nodes and the font size of the terms of the nodes are proportional
authentic leadership, charismatic leadership and leadership to the co-occurrence frequencies.

Fig. 3. The network of major leadership constructs used in 200 landmark leadership documents.

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As presented in Fig. 5, we have Citespace visualization in four time high citation bursts in the co-citation network, representing emerging
periods. In the first time period (1990–1996), the topic of power, in- new directions for future research (Chen, 2006). A citation burst in-
fluence, and politics is the most salient leadership category which re- dicates an abrupt increase in citations, and it provides a useful tool for
flects the fact that power is the basis of leadership. In the same time tracing the development of leadership research trends over time (Cobo
period, transformational leadership and charismatic leadership emerge et al., 2011; Liu & Gui, 2016). As such, based on newly published (i.e.,
as important leadership theories. since 2010) articles with high citation bursts, we identify some specific
In the second time period (1997–2003), the traditional power per- directions of leadership research.
spective of leadership becomes less salient, while transformational
leadership and charismatic leadership become more salient. LMX be- Trend 1: transformational leadership revisited
comes a significant leadership theory. Leadership in teams also emerges
as a theme in this period. Although we discuss the recent developments of major leadership
Starting from the third time period (2004 to 2010), topics of ethical research topics, as indicated in the four time periods of Fig. 5, our
leadership and authentic leadership start to emerge to emphasize va- findings suggest that transformational leadership remains at the center
lues. At the same time, leaders' emotions and abusive supervision also of leadership research. This finding is in line with other recent lea-
gain attention. Finally, shared leadership and leadership development dership reviews such as Lord et al. (2017) and Meuser et al. (2016).
become new frontiers. Scholars have continually revisited transformational leadership
In the most recent time period (2011–2017), the value-based theme theory for several reasons, which also indicate future research direc-
of leadership continues to bloom as authentic leadership and servant tions. First, recent studies embrace leadership theories that can account
leadership emerge. Most recent studies on followership shift the focus for the multi-level influences of leadership. Transformational leadership
from leader to follower. The rising role of emotion in leadership reflects is appropriate for examination at the firm (Waldman, Siegel, & Javidan,
a new trend in leadership research. 2006), the team (Schaubroeck, Lam, & Cha, 2007) and the individual
levels (Walumbwa, Avolio, & Zhu, 2008). Leadership researchers also
Roadmap for future research have refined transformational leadership theory regarding dual-level
(individual-focused and group-focused) transformational leadership
As elucidated in the opening quote of this paper, there is a need to (Wang & Howell, 2010). Future research could advance multi-level
understand the trajectory of leadership research and how the field of leadership research by using transformational leadership as a focal
leadership is evolving. In our bibliometric review, we visualize the leadership theory.
landscape and evolution of leadership research. To help spark leader- Second, at the within-person level, daily studies of transformational
ship research and move this literature forward, we discuss the insights leadership behaviors adopting experience sampling methodology (ESM)
gleaned from our bibliometric review, with a focus on open questions, provide a new lens for research (Breevaart et al., 2014; Lanaj, Johnson, &
future research directions, and implications. Lee, 2016; Tepper et al., 2018; Tims et al., 2011). For example, according
We link our summary of future directions with our findings in to affective events theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996) and self-determi-
Figs. 1–5. Based on our main findings discussed in the Bibliometric nation theory (Gagné & Deci, 2005), transformational leaders could
analyses and results section, we identify five major trends in leadership benefit from their own transformational leadership behaviors by enhan-
research: 1) transformational leadership revisited; 2) a value-based cing their daily need satisfaction and positive affect (Lanaj et al., 2016).
stream of leadership and the dark side of leadership; 3) a shift from a Investigating the antecedents and consequences of the within-person
focus on unilateral social influence to mutual influence; 4) leadership in dynamics of daily transformational leadership might be a fruitful avenue
teams; and 5) exploration of new dependent variables. for future research. The extent to which leadership behavior varies
Also, for each of the main research trends, we identify several im- within-person from one day to the next, which differs across leaders, may
portant topics based on influential leadership works listed in Table 2. also provide additional insights (see Johnson, Venus, Lanaj, Mao, &
These papers have high-frequency indices in the co-citation network or Chang, 2012; Matta, Scott, Colquitt, Koopman, & Passantino, 2017).

Fig. 4. Journal co-citation network of leadership research during 1990–2017.

Note. The journal co-citation network shows only the most co-cited journals. Each node represents one journal and edges represent the co-citations relationship of two
journals.

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Fig. 5. The time-zone visualization of leadership-related keywords in leadership research during 1990–2017.
Note. The time-zone visualization shows only the keywords with highest co-occurrence frequency. The keywords were shown in the time-zone when they became one
of the most popular leadership constructs. The node size is proportional to the total and accumulated co-occurrence frequencies of keywords.

Third, transformational leadership is change-oriented leadership demonstrate that different lines of research tend to achieve consensus
(Gil, Rico, Alcover, & Barrasa, 2005). Recent studies on leadership in- regarding direct examination of ethical leadership, servant leadership,
fluences have considered outcome variables such as voice behavior, authentic leadership and abusive supervision.
creativity, and proactive behaviors. All these variables are change-or-
iented (Fuller, Marler, & Hester, 2006; Kim, Y, & Lee, 2010; Parker & A value-based stream of leadership
Collins, 2010), implying the proactive and discretionary nature of the In Table 2 and Fig. 5, results show that recent studies focus more on
behaviors. Such outcome variables are consistent with the changing new types of leadership behaviors, especially those with value ele-
role of transformational leadership. Thus, this changing nature of ments. Such new types of leadership behaviors include ethical leader-
transformational leadership echoes the recent call for organizational ship (Brown, Treviño, & Harrison, 2005; Mayer et al., 2009), authentic
behavior via a change perspective (Tims et al., 2011), and future re- leadership (Gardner et al., 2011), and servant leadership (Liden et al.,
search could further advance understanding of when and how trans- 2008). We introduce the future directions of these three types of lea-
formational leadership influences change-oriented outcomes such as dership behaviors as follows, via integrating our analysis of Fig. 3,
voice behavior, creativity, and proactive behaviors. Fig. 5, and Table 2 accordingly.
Lastly but most fundamentally, a significant trend of transforma- It is noteworthy that according to Fig. 5, the area of ethical lea-
tional leadership is associated with the call for tackling the underlying dership starts to emerge in the years 2004–2010. However, it becomes
theoretical foundation of transformational leadership. For example, van quite central in the time span of 2011–2017. In Table 2, Brown et al.'s
Knippenberg and Sitkin (2013) point out the lack of a concrete theo- (2005) paper, which contributes to the literature with a scale of ethical
retical framework or the low construct validity of transformational leadership, has a high burst of 45.3. In Fig. 3, ethical leadership has
leadership due to its high correlation with the contingent reward di- strong connections with team leadership, trait theories and abusive
mension in transactional leadership (Judge & Piccolo, 2004). Some supervision; future research could look into its association with cross-
scholars have begun to focus on specific and observable dimensions of cultural leadership, leadership development, strategic leadership, and
transformational leadership, such as visionary leadership, and adopted emotions and leadership. For example, will different cultures impact
identification theory to understand vision communication, followers' followers' assessment of ethical leaders (Chhokar, Brodbeck, & House,
possible selves, and identification with collective vision and goal ac- 2013)? Alternatively, how can ethical leadership in multiple levels be
complishments (e.g., Stam, Lord, van Knippenberg, & Wisse, 2014; developed by cultivating ethical cultures (Mayer et al., 2009; Mayer
Venus, Johnson, Zhang, Wang, & Lanaj, 2018; Venus, Stam, & van et al., 2012; Schaubroeck et al., 2012)? How do ethical leaders exhibit
Knippenberg, 2013). These studies inspire and call for new intellectual their emotions when managing ethical issues and how does emotional
debates and novel viewpoints about transformational leadership. sensitivity influence leaders' and followers' ethical decision-making? In
addition, future research could examine within-person spillover models
Trend 2: value-based leadership and the dark side of leadership in which initial ethical leadership behavior affects a leader's subsequent
behavior (e.g., abusive supervision; Lin et al., 2016). Lastly, as existing
Consistent with a growing focus on social responsibility in cor- studies more often focus on formal leaders' ethical influences but rarely
porations, more research is emerging regarding value-based leadership on co-workers' ethical impact on employees (Mayer et al., 2009), we
(Antonakis & Day, 2017). Our bibliometric analyses clearly call for an examination of peers' ethical leadership influences in teams.

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Authentic leadership is viewed as the root concept of positive and look into the emotional fluctuations of abusive supervisors and fol-
value-based leadership (Avolio & Gardner, 2005; Gardner et al., 2011). lowers on a daily basis. Recent research has begun to examine third
In Fig. 5, authentic leadership emerges in the time span of 2004–2010 parties' reactions to the abusive supervision of a co-worker beyond the
and becomes more popular during 2011–2017. In Fig. 3, leadership leader-member dyadic relationship (Mitchell, Vogel, & Folger, 2015;
network indicates that authentic leadership has linkages with leader- Shao, Li, & Mawritz, 2018). We call for more studies to focus on abusive
ship development and servant leadership studies. However, one chal- supervision using an observer or third-party perspective. For example, a
lenge of authentic leadership is the lack of connection with strategic new direction could be examining observers' schadenfreude––pleasure
leadership suggested in Fig. 3. It is quite important to explore how CEO at colleagues' suffering from abusive supervision (Li, McAllister, Ilies, &
authenticity or authentic leaders in the upper echelon influence firm, Gloor, in press). Also, future research could further focus on how fol-
team and employee outcomes. Another challenge is the construct va- lowers can successfully break the spiral of abusive supervision over
lidity issue. A recent meta-analysis by Hoch, Bommer, Dulebohn, and time, thus reducing future abuse and reaching a reconciliation with a
Wu (2018) detects high correlations between authentic leadership and leader (Wee, Liao, Liu, & Liu, 2017). Complementing these victim and
transformational leadership, calling for studies to prove the high di- third party perspectives, more research that explores the implications of
vergent and convergent validity of authentic leadership measure(s). In abusive supervision for actors (i.e., leaders) would be informative (Liao,
the future, it is important to continue to explore the unique and im- Yam, Johnson, Liu, & Song, 2018; Lin et al., 2016). The fact that leaders
portant contributions of authentic leadership theory. engage in such behaviors despite their negative consequences for sub-
Regarding servant leadership, Liden et al. (2008) demonstrate the ordinates and workgroups suggests such behavior may, in some ways,
high discriminant validity of servant leadership vis-à-vis transforma- be reinforcing for leaders, at least in the short term (Qin, Huang,
tional leadership and LMX. Servant leadership facilitates employee Johnson, Ju, & Hu, 2018).
performance, creativity and helping behavior (Liden, Wayne, Liao, & It is intriguing to adopt a cultural perspective to examine the re-
Meuser, 2014; Neubert, Kacmar, Carlson, Chonko, & Roberts, 2008), lationship between abusive supervision and job outcomes. For example,
and team performance (Schaubroeck et al., 2011). As shown in Fig. 5, people in different cultural contexts have varied levels of sensitivity
servant leadership starts to emerge in the years 2011–2017. In this towards abusive supervision (Shao, Rupp, Skarlicki, & Jones, 2013).
latest time period, servant leadership as a new type of leadership gains Research reveals that there is a curvilinear, inverted-U relationship
more attention in the literature. In Fig. 3, servant leadership has con- between abusive supervision and employees' creativity in a sample
nections with areas of authentic leadership, transformational leader- composed of South Korean dyads of supervisors and subordinates (Lee,
ship, team leadership, and emotions and leadership. Servant leaders Yun, & Srivastava, 2013). It is not clear whether the finding that
empower and develop others and put subordinates' interests and career creativity is highest in the presence of some moderate level of abusive
development ahead of the leader's own interests (Gregory Stone, supervision is unique to an Asian cultural context that emphasizes
Russell, & Patterson, 2004; van Dierendonck, 2011). Leaders and fol- power distance (Newman & Nollen, 1996; Rank, Pace, & Frese, 2004).
lowers have a high-quality dyadic relationship, which is beneficial to
develop followers. Future studies can further explore the relationship Trend 3: from unilateral social influence to mutual influence
between servant leadership and themes of followership, leader-member
exchange, and leadership development. Leadership theories traditionally focus on the top-down social in-
On the other side of the coin, servant leaders might encounter those fluence of leaders on followers (Lord et al., 2017). Recently, follower-
followers who take advantage of the discretion, autonomy and trust ship becomes a rapidly emerging area of research (Uhl-Bien et al.,
provided by servant leaders and fail to regulate themselves or are re- 2014). As shown in Fig. 5, the theme of followership starts to emerge as
luctant to face tough challenges. Future study of servant leadership a major topic in the period 2011–2017. This finding sheds light on the
might look into servant leader “tough love”, as leaders provide both mutual influence perspective, that is, followers can be proactive and
negative and constructive feedback to their followers (Zhong, Stouten, even able to change their leaders' attitudes and behaviors (Chaleff,
& Liden, 2018). 1995; Uhl-Bien et al., 2014).
Voluminous studies demonstrate the positive impacts of ethical, Surprisingly, in Fig. 3, there is no connection between followership
authentic and servant leadership styles on the outcomes of employees and LMX, although in Table 2, Uhl-Bien's (2006) paper on the relational
and teams. We call for more research to link these value-based lea- leadership perspective underlying LMX has a high burst index. There-
dership behaviors with virtues such as humility (Owens & Hekman, fore, to understand the development of followership and to link follo-
2012, 2016), gratitude (Fehr, Fulmer, Awtrey, & Miller, 2017), and wership with leadership, we call for more research connecting follo-
forgiveness (Fehr & Gelfand, 2012). Indeed, we also notice a growing wership together with the relational leadership perspective (Uhl-Bien,
body of research on trait theories that tests the interaction between 2006) and LMX (Dulebohn et al., 2012). Specifically, more attention is
leader humility and narcissism (Owens, Wallace, & Waldman, 2015). needed to explore how employees enter into and develop in the fol-
lower role (Uhl-Bien et al., 2014). Future studies could address this
The dark side of leadership need by examining the trajectories of newcomers' LMX development.
In Fig. 5, abusive supervision emerges in the time span of Recent studies on newcomers' socialization (e.g., Zhu, Tatachari, &
2004–2010 and becomes more popular during 2011–2017 (i.e., Chattopadhyay, 2017) may also inspire scholars to investigate LMX
Mackey, Frieder, Brees, & Martinko, 2017; Tepper, 2007). Looking at relationship formation or leader emergence via a dynamic perspective.
Table 2, the papers by Tepper, Duffy, Henle, and Lambert (2006) and Investigating followership and mutual influence from the perspec-
Aryee et al. (2007) are quite influential. They have high burst indices. tive of social network might also be a fruitful avenue for future research
Both of these papers examine the antecedents of abusive supervision, (Zhu, Liao, Yam, & Johnson, 2018). A given follower occupies many
which is organizational justice. In the future, more studies are necessary relational roles in an organization, which requires social network ap-
to explore the factors influencing abusive supervision. Fig. 3 indicates proaches for disentangling how followers interact with and relate to
that abusive supervision relates closely to ethical leadership and team their immediate supervisors, higher level managers, top executives
leadership, but not with other leadership areas such as emotions and (e.g., CEOs), peers, and even their own subordinates. It is possible that
leadership. We call for more research on abusive supervision's impact followership types and network features jointly influence employees'
on employees' negative affectivity and anger (Aryee et al., 2007; Oh & leadership capabilities development and career development. For ex-
Farh, 2017), as well as retaliation from followers. Future research might ample, a dynamic network approach might be useful to investigate

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shared leadership development at different time stages. In this regard, (2007) examines shared leadership in teams. It has a relatively high
Porter and Woo (2015) review and introduce a psychological perspec- burst of 20.9, so shared leadership has become a popular topic of re-
tive from which individuals initiate, build, and maintain social net- search in recent years, and still needs attention in future studies. Shared
works. leadership research reflects a new domain of examining mutual influ-
Given the intertwined co-existence of followership and leadership ences of leadership (Zhu et al., 2018). It is about leading each other in
(DeRue & Ashford, 2010), it is necessary for scholars to examine the the team (Carson et al., 2007; Ensley, Hmieleski, & Pearce, 2006; Pearce
two topics in tandem in the future. Some inquiries could be put for- & Conger, 2003), with either formal or informal leaders. Thus, the
ward, such as identifying categories or typologies of followership be- unique nature of shared leadership calls for new theories to capture the
haviors (e.g., constructive, proactive, and disruptive followership). essence of mutual social influences at the team level.
Also, future research could identify more or less effective followership Recent meta-analyses of shared leadership (D'Innocenzo, Mathieu, &
behaviors (Uhl-Bien et al., 2014). For example, bottom-up actions taken Kukenberger, 2016; Nicolaides et al., 2014; Wang, Waldman, & Zhang,
by followers can break the spiral of abusive supervision to achieve 2014) document that shared leadership can promote team performance.
leader-follower reconciliation via the use of coping strategies to change In addition, team confidence partially mediates the linkage between
the balance of power in the leader-follower relationship (Wee et al., shared leadership and team performance (Nicolaides et al., 2014). Fu-
2017). ture research could go further to investigate alternative psychological
Lastly, as shown in Fig. 3, followership is linked with leadership mechanisms of shared leadership on various team outcomes such as
development. The abovementioned followership-related studies also team sustainability, team creativity, and team organizational citizen-
shed light on the development of leadership. An important direction of ship behavior. Also, given that shared leadership is a promising way to
leadership development research is adopting a longitudinal design to enable team effectiveness, it is valuable to investigate the antecedents
capture personal trajectories of development (Day et al., 2014). For of shared leadership (Carson et al., 2007).
example, future studies could examine social network evolvement and Temporality and dynamic process analyses are central inquiries for
social capital accumulation in the process of leadership development shared leadership in future studies, echoing the call for research by
over time (Day et al., 2004). Pearce and Conger (2003) in their shared leadership book. Also, future
research needs longitudinal designs to understand how shared leader-
Trend 4: leadership in teams ship develops over time by looking at changes in a leadership network
(Carson et al., 2007).
With growing popularity of team-based work in organizations, there Also noteworthy, the dark side of shared leadership is often ne-
are several pioneering works that engage with leadership of teamwork glected by the literature, yet is worthy of exploration. For example,
(Batistič et al., 2017; Day et al., 2004; Morgeson et al., 2010). One main shared leadership might have a negative impact on employees' crea-
stream of team leadership research applies generic leadership models tivity, which is known as the “iron cage” effect (Barker, 1993). Shared
that are not specific to teams and that mostly concentrates on trans- leadership could result in high peer pressure among team members. The
formational leadership and LMX (Lord et al., 2017; van Knippenberg, autonomy of individual employees might be threatened due to ag-
2017). Another main stream of research has been developed with a gregated behaviors normalized via shared leadership.
more specific focus on teams and that revolves largely around shared
leadership (Lord et al., 2017; van Knippenberg, 2017). Trend 5: exploration of new outcome variables

Team leadership Leadership research can also be extended by considering new out-
Leadership in teams is a dual-level phenomenon. Wang and Howell come variables. Our analyses reveal that the leadership literature has a
(2010) argue that leaders need to motivate individual employees and stable focus on subordinate and team organizational citizenship beha-
improve team outcomes simultaneously. Considering the difference vior and task performance, consistent with the review of Hiller,
between individuals and the whole team, future studies should focus on DeChurch, Murase, and Doty (2011). Nevertheless, there is a remark-
leaders' different behaviors when they are confronted with an in- able increasing trend of new outcomes such as creativity, voice beha-
dividual subordinate or the whole team (Wu et al., 2010). Future stu- viors (Parker & Collins, 2010), and proactive behaviors (Parker &
dies can further investigate the different roles played by leaders at the Collins, 2010; Zhang, Song, Wang, & Liu, 2018). Moreover, moving
two levels. beyond subordinate outcomes, research is beginning to examine how
A more prominent line of research involves new operationalizations leadership behaviors impact the cognition, affect, and behavior of the
of leadership at the team level, which reflects special conceptualiza- leaders themselves (e.g., Johnson, Lanaj, & Barnes, 2014; Lanaj et al.,
tions to fit with multi-level theories and phenomena. For example, LMX 2016; Liao et al., 2018; Lin et al., 2016; Qin et al., 2018).
differentiation refers to the degree of within-group variation that exists As identified by our bibliometric analyses, out of the 200 papers
when leaders form relationships of varying quality with different with a high level of impact, there are four papers directly examining the
members (e.g., Erdogan & Bauer, 2010; Henderson, Liden, Glibkowski, relationship between leadership and well-being. Well-being has become
& Chaudhry, 2009; Liden, Erdogan, Wayne, & Sparrowe, 2006; Yu, an important outcome variable over the years (Arnold, Turner, Barling,
Matta, & Cornfield, 2018). LMX differentiation has an impact on in- Kelloway, & Mckee, 2007; Ilies, Morgeson, & Nahrgang, 2005; Skakon,
dividual outcomes (Erdogan & Bauer, 2010; Liden et al., 2006) as well Nielsen, Borg, & Guzman, 2010), which indicates that leadership re-
as team outcomes (Le Blanc & González-Romá, 2012). On the basis of search is showing interests in subjective well-being. We call for future
the team-level conceptualization, future research could further explore research to examine followers' subjective well-being and long-term
boundary conditions or context variables of the above relationships and impact of leadership in this regard.
the implications of these team-level variables as a context that shapes The spectrum of outcome variables is also increased by leadership
the relevant associations. scholars who consider detrimental (or dark side) work attitudes and
behaviors. Such outcome variables include cynicism, detachment, dis-
Shared leadership identification, incivility, deviance, counterproductive behaviors, and
According to Fig. 5, we can see that the area of shared leadership unethical behaviors. There is room for additional studies to explore new
starts to emerge as a major leadership theme in the period 2004–2010, outcomes variables to enrich leadership studies, including team- and
and gains momentum during 2011–2017. In Table 2, Carson et al. company-level outcome variables (see Hiller et al., 2011).

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Equipped with implicit theories of motivation and associative eva- analyzing the landscape and evolvement of individual leadership the-
luation perspective, other types of outcome variables could be perfor- ories. We believe it is feasible for future researchers to adopt biblio-
mance evaluation (Wang, Wong, & Kwong, 2010) and recognition of metric mapping methods and code the most influential papers in a
creativity (Mueller, Melwani, Loewenstein, & Deal, 2018; Zhou, Wang, specific area, in order to plot frontiers of each topic of leadership as well
Song, & Wu, 2017). Recently, scholars are investigating the interaction as internal connections of various sub-topics over time. It is also pos-
of individual traits such as promotive regulatory focus and firm context sible in the future to look at a specific topic, for example, the re-
represented by organizational culture on the recognition of employees' lationship between transformational leadership and creativity or be-
creativity (Zhou et al., 2017). These studies shed light on the im- tween ethical leadership and counterproductive work behavior.
portance of leadership traits and behaviors for recognizing creativity.
Conclusion
Discussion
Despite being a widely studied and popular topic in social science,
Limitations there has not been a comprehensive bibliometric review that quanti-
tatively visualizes how the leadership research landscape has evolved.
This study has some limitations that should be noted. First, the re- To address this research gap, we use the visualization tool CiteSpace to
sults should be interpreted in light of our sample, because the analyses detect the research frontiers, major topics, landmark documents, and
were conducted within our sample as opposed to all published leader- articles with bursts within the leadership literature. Based on this in-
ship studies. Leadership research is increasingly vibrant and diverse, formation, we analyze how the landscape of leadership research evolves
and there is a large volume of leadership studies across dozens of dis- over time. In addition, we offer future research agendas based on the
ciplines in the literature. Although our sample is among the largest in current state-of-the-science. In doing so, this review provides scholars
the leadership literature, it has boundaries that should be noted. We with a systematic understanding of the landscape and emerging trends
collected data from four areas (management, business, applied psy- in the literature. It also identifies research frontiers in leadership re-
chology, and social psychology) in the Web of Science core citation search and provides scholars with a roadmap to move these research
database since 1990. Before 1990, some leadership studies are included frontiers forward.
in other areas of the Web of Science core citation database (e.g., poli-
tical science, public administration, zoology). For example, both References
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