Is Florida Really that Interesting? State Geographic Bias in Public Administration Research

Abstract

The authors examine whether there are geographic biases in public administration research. They use a dataset of 557 research articles from top public administration journals in which specific state names appear in the title or abstract. Findings suggest that not only is a mass of public administration research concentrated in four states (Florida, California, New York, and Texas), but specific thematic topics and policy areas are associated with each of those states. In general, this suggests that authors need to consider if continuing these trends creates a blind spot for research bias in the field, where the collective understanding of a specific topic is disproportionately influenced by data from a single state. The broad implications are that how states serve as a research setting should be actively considered by authors.