January Observation

In reviewing critical incident studies done in the past few years, I can observe that many do not follow the design structures that Flanagan outlined. For example, many gather what are described as perceptions or beliefs. Flanagan said the CIT wanted to record actual behaviors or remembered behaviors. I think this is a critical but common flaw in the way many use the CIT. A second observation is that many do studies setting out in advance to specify a number of research subjects they will interview. This again violates Flanagan's idea that one should begin gathering critical incidents in an iterative fashion until no new specific behaviors can be identified--thus achieving saturation. Many CIT researchers seem to have missed this important element.