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This paper compares and contrasts practice-based perceptions of the research–practice gap in the United States (US) with those in Australia.

The current study extends the work of Tucker and Lowe (2014) by comparing and contrasting their Australian-based findings with evidence from a questionnaire survey and follow-up interviews with senior representatives of 18 US state and national professional accounting associations.

The extent to which academic research informs practice is perceived to be limited, despite the potential for academic research findings to make a significant contribution to management accounting practice. We find similarities as well as differences in the major obstacles to closer engagement in the US and Australia. This comparison, however, leads us to offer a more fundamental explanation of the divide between academic research and practice framed in terms of the relative benefits and costs of academics engaging with practice.

Rather than following conventional approaches to ‘bridging the gap’ by identifying barriers to the adoption of research, we suggest that only after academics have adequate incentives to speak to practice can barriers to a more effective diffusion of their research findings be surmounted.

This study makes three novel contributions to the “relevance literature” in management accounting. First, it adopts a distinct theoretical vantage point to organize, analyze, and interpret empirical evidence. Second, it captures practice-based views about the nature and extent of the divide between research and practice. Third, it provides a foundational assessment of the generalizability of the gap by examining perceptions of it across two different geographic contexts.

Community-based randomised control trials (RCTs) rely heavily on the involvement and collaboration of statutory and third-sector services and their employees. This paper seeks to explore the experiences of practitioners working within a statutory children and family service setting that delivered additional parenting programmes evaluated by an RCT.

Practitioners completed a semi-structured interview about their experiences of the research trial based on a topic guide. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed using thematic analysis.

Results suggest that the experience of being involved in research was mostly positive for practitioners, but also produced additional stress. The research brought them the experience of being involved with national and international teams; and they valued the additional supervision and training that they received. They spoke about the skills that they developed and how they were able to continue to use these after the research trial had ended.

Little is known about how services working alongside major research projects experience their involvement and what impact, if any, this has on them. This may be important as it could influence successful recruitment and retention of practitioners during RCTs, and the successful design and execution of other types of evaluation.

The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between practitioners and academics in scholarly communication in library and information science (LIS) journals.

The research is based on a reader survey, a citation analysis and an editor survey. The reader survey identifies both differences in journal rankings between practitioners and academics and the contribution of practitioners to LIS journals. The editor survey provides the proportions of practitioners and academics for the journals. The citation analysis shows the disparities in information exchange between the journals mainly preferred by practitioners and those more favoured by academics. Furthermore, it is possible to explore if practitioner journals differ from academic journals in the citation indicators and in other data collected in the editor survey.

It is found that: practitioners play an active role both as readers and as authors of articles in LIS journals; there is only a low level of information exchange between practitioner and academic journals; the placement of advertisements, the size of the editorial board, requirements concerning an extensive bibliography, the number and the half‐life of the references show a clear distinction between practitioner and academic journals. Interestingly, the impact factor did not turn out to be a good indicator to differentiate a practitioner from an academic journal.

This research is only exploratory because it is based on separate studies previously conducted. Further research is also needed to explore the relationship between practitioners and academics more deeply.

The value of this paper lies in bringing together the findings from complementary studies (reader survey, editor survey and citation analysis) and identifying hypotheses for future research, especially with regards to the roles of and interactions between LIS practitioners and academics in scholarly communication.

Given marketing's fundamentally applied nature, to compare the relative impacts in the academy of work published by three groups – practitioners, practitioner‐academic alliances, and academics.Design/methodology/approach – Social Sciences Citation Index data were used to estimate the influence of 438 articles published by practitioners, practitioner‐academic alliances, and academics in five marketing journals over the period 1970‐2000.Findings – Citations for academic research were more than twice as high as those for practitioners. Conversely, citations for practitioner‐academic research rival those of the academics, and sometimes exceed them.Research limitations/implications – Only considered US marketing journals.Practical implications – Despite some excellent citation evidence for practitioner‐academic work, additional cooperative efforts must be pursued to ensure the relevance of academic marketing research to practitioner needs.Originality/value – This is the only study to “objectively” address the impact of practitioner, practitioner‐academic alliance, and academic research in the academy.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a comprehensive theory as to why academic research in accounting is said not to help practice.

The authors (1) present a comprehensive literature review in the academic/practitioner gap arena, and (2) develop a theoretical background for it. Further, they identify (3) the different information needs of these groups using value group theory and (4) the inherent factors and personality traits that influence career choice. Next, they (5) evaluate the values of each subgroup. They then (6) theorize what types of accounting research would interest each. They argue that (7) individuals who enter the academy differ from those who enter practice, and (8) the socialization processes and the impact of the professional setting (practice or academe) on behaviors further the separation of academic research from practitioner needs.

This paper is theoretical. It suggests that bridging the gap will be difficult. The study is theoretical. The limitation is that it does not empirically test the relationships hypothesized. By providing a comprehensive model of factors underlying the gap, however, it can be a fruitful source of research ideas for years to come. The implications are that it will be difficult to bridge the gap between accounting practitioners and academics. Having a greater understanding of the causes of the gap, however, may be very useful in fostering thought as to how to overcome it.

Prior literature on the topic is largely atheoretical. This paper is the first to develop a broad theory of the gap.

Within the developing exploration of the role of the scholar-practitioner, the situation in which scholar-practitioners engage in the scholarship of practice in their own organizational systems has not received much attention. This chapter adopts the position that scholar-practitioners are not merely practitioners who do research but rather that they integrate scholarship in their practice and generate actionable knowledge, that is, knowledge that is robust for scholars and actionable for practitioners. This chapter explores the phenomenon of scholar-practitioners engaging in the scholarship of practice in their own organizational systems as inside change agents. It discusses how scholar-practitioners engage in inquiry-in-action in first-, second-, and third-person modes of inquiry and practice in the present tense and provides a methodology and methods for such engagement that it be rigorous, reflective, and relevant.

The purpose of this paper is to comment on the differences in perceptions that exist between academic and professional marketing researchers, as creators of new marketing knowledge, and explore how academics and practitioners can work together better on areas of mutual interest or separately on areas where their interests do not coincide.

The approach is via two focus groups, one with researchers in marketing from universities and one with commercial market researchers, and via online surveys of the same target groups, with 638 respondents in all.

The study indicates that the two sample groups have relatively congruent views about the advantages and disadvantages of each other's approach to research but both groups believe they could do more to make their research more comprehensible and accessible to each other.

The empirical study was conducted in the UK only, and the response rate from the university marketing research community was disappointingly low. These represent limitations on the generalisability of the findings.

It is argued that marketing research can be undertaken separately by academics and practitioner researchers but that joint working between academic and commercial marketing researchers represents another dimension to marketing research which could be facilitated by the creation of joint initiatives, including industry‐inspired academic‐practitioner research projects and the development of government‐funded academic‐practitioner research projects, building on both groups' unique sets of skills.

The paper reports on the outcome of an empirical study that has implications for the conduct of marketing research in universities and market research agencies.

The purpose of the empirical study was to examine whether strategies shown to work well in one model of network development for library and information science (LIS) practitioners and researchers could be applied successfully in the development of a new network and contribute to the narrowing of the research–practice gap in LIS.

Overall, 32 members of a new professional network were surveyed by a questionnaire following the completion of a programme of four network events held between 2019 and 2021.

The analysis demonstrates the transferability of the existing model of network development to a new network and that it can be successfully adapted for online delivery of network events and activities.

The criteria deployed for the evaluation of the new network could be used in other similar settings. Funding bodies can also use these findings as demonstration of the value of their investment in network grants.

This contribution on means of growing collaborative networks to narrow the LIS research–practice gap stands out in contrast with prior research that tends to focus the support of research productivity of academic librarians in North American universities for the purposes of career development. Here wider aspects of research engagement are considered of value for LIS practitioners from a range of sectors and institutions, beyond North America, for purposes that are broader than personal advancement.

The purpose of this paper is to look beyond the data and findings of a joint practitioner-research project to illustrate how joint practitioner-research can influence practice and stimulate meaningful partnership working from the bottom up within a social care setting. The impact of this integrated approach to practice and learning can enable improved outcomes for people.

The authors outline the research and explore the reflective process underlying the project including the subsequent phase of implementation. This examines what the authors, as practitioner-researchers, understood from the practice, heard from carers and fellow workers, and learnt from each other.

The authors consider the project in the wider context of evidence-based practice. Key enablers and challenges are identified to the production of joint practitioner-research and more broadly to outcomes for carers. The authors also examine the reflective process of joint working between individuals and the impact this can have on facilitating integrated working, at both a practice and service level.

The learning from this project evidences the value of meaningful joint working between practitioners and the impact this can have at different levels of integration. It also looks beyond the practitioner-research project to the stages of implementing findings and planning for ongoing joint working. It is therefore pertinent to many organisations looking to integrate and orientate towards a focus on outcomes for people.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the co‐production of knowledge and dialogic relationships via the collaboration between business practitioners and academic researchers.

The motivations, expectations, communication processes, and final performance of those engaged in collaborative management research are explored by applying a two‐pronged methodology with a content analysis and an e‐mail survey. The authors conducted a content analysis on 136 articles identified out of a total of 2,029 articles from six leading journals during 2006‐2011 which fulfilled the criteria of being coauthored by both professors and practitioners. An e‐mail survey of six open questions was given to pre‐screened authors in the first stage to investigate the in‐depth dialogue processes and stories of these collaborations.

The results revealed that collaboration topics of interest focused mostly on organizational behavior, business policy, and strategy, and that theoretical inquiry and case study were the most used research methods. According to the 68 valid returned e‐mail surveys, the providing of consulting services by professors in firms plays a critical role in facilitating knowledge co‐creation between practice and knowing. The findings also highlight key factors of sustainable co‐production relationships.

This study provides an empirical, valuable step towards an investigation into the co‐creation dialogue experiences of practitioners and academics in three dimensions: purpose, procedure, and promise.