Subfield · Applied Psychology
Most cited papers in Applied Psychology
What are the most cited papers in Applied Psychology?
The most cited paper in Applied Psychology is "The theory of planned behavior" (Icek Ajzen, 1991), with 87,913 citations. Next come "Common method biases in behavioral research: A critical review of the literature and recommended remedies." (80,679) and "Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control" (40,874).
Showing 50 of 98 papers. Every paper with more than 3,961 citations is listed.
| # | Paper | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The theory of planned behavior Icek Ajzen · Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes | Dec 1991 | 87,913 |
| 2 | Common method biases in behavioral research: A critical review of the literature and recommended remedies. Philip M. Podsakoff, SCOTT B. MACKENZIE, Jeong Yeon Lee et al. · Journal of Applied Psychology | 2003 | 80,679 |
| 3 | Self-Efficacy: The Exercise of Control Albert Bandura, Wendy Freeman, Richard Lightsey · Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy | 1999 | 40,874 |
| 4 | The "What" and "Why" of Goal Pursuits: Human Needs and the Self-Determination of Behavior Edward L. Deci, Richard M. Ryan · Psychological Inquiry | Oct 2000 | 33,752 |
| 5 | Sources of Method Bias in Social Science Research and Recommendations on How to Control It Philip M. Podsakoff, SCOTT B. MACKENZIE, Nathan Philip Podsakoff · Annual Review of Psychology | Mar 2011 | 15,513 |
| 6 | The behaviour change wheel: A new method for characterising and designing behaviour change interventions Susan G. Michie, Maartje Marieke van Stralen, Robert West · Implementation Science | 23 Apr 2011 | 14,380 |
| 7 | The Psychology of Interpersonal Relations. Theodore M. Newcomb, Fritz Heider · American Sociological Review | Dec 1958 | 11,956 |
| 8 | On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudaimonic Well-Being Richard M. Ryan, Edward L. Deci · Annual Review of Psychology | Feb 2001 | 11,546 |
| 9 | Subjective well-being: Three decades of progress. Ed Diener, Eunkook Mark Suh, Richard E. Lucas et al. · Psychological Bulletin | Mar 1999 | 11,478 |
| 10 | The social readjustment rating scale Thomas H. Holmes, Richard H. Rahe · Journal of Psychosomatic Research | Aug 1967 | 11,193 |
| 11 | Construct validity in psychological tests. Lee J. Cronbach, Paul E. Meehl · Psychological Bulletin | Jul 1955 | 11,076 |
| 12 | The Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence: a revision of the Fagerstrom Tolerance Questionnaire Todd F. Heatherton, Lynn T. Kozlowski, Richard C. Frecker et al. · British Journal of Addiction | Sep 1991 | 10,879 |
| 13 | Calculating and reporting effect sizes to facilitate cumulative science: a practical primer for t-tests and ANOVAs Daniël Lakens · Frontiers in Psychology | 2013 | 10,466 |
| 14 | Amazon's Mechanical Turk Michael D. Buhrmester, Tracy Kwang, Samuel D. Gosling · Perspectives on Psychological Science | 2011 | 10,128 |
| 15 | Efficacy of the Theory of Planned Behaviour: A meta‐analytic review Christopher J. Armitage, Mark T. Conner · British Journal of Social Psychology | Dec 2001 | 9,991 |
| 16 | Positive psychology: An introduction. Martin E. P. Seligman, Mihály Csíkszentmihályi · American Psychologist | 2000 | 9,964 |
| 17 | ‘Small Changes' to Diet and Physical Activity Behaviors for Weight Management Andrew Peter Hills, Nuala Mary Byrne, Rachel C. Lindstrom et al. · Obesity Facts | 2013 | 9,508 |
| 18 | Assessing coping strategies: A theoretically based approach. Charles S. Carver, M F Scheier, Jagdish K. Weintraub · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | 1989 | 9,308 |
| 19 | A new scale of social desirability independent of psychopathology. Douglas P. Crowne, David Marlowe · Journal of Consulting Psychology | Aug 1960 | 8,768 |
| 20 | The Health Belief Model: A Decade Later Nancy K. Janz, Marshall H. Becker · Health Education Quarterly | Mar 1984 | 8,531 |
| 21 | The case for motivated reasoning. Ziva Kunda · Psychological Bulletin | 1990 | 8,390 |
| 22 | The Behavior Change Technique Taxonomy (v1) of 93 Hierarchically Clustered Techniques: Building an International Consensus for the Reporting of Behavior Change Interventions Susan G. Michie, Michelle Richardson, Marie Johnston et al. · Annals of Behavioral Medicine | 19 Mar 2013 | 8,236 |
| 23 | Accounting for common method variance in cross-sectional research designs. Michael K. Lindell, David J. Whitney · Journal of Applied Psychology | 2001 | 8,130 |
| 24 | The Epidemiology of Major Depressive Disorder Ronald C. Kessler, Patricia A. Berglund, Olga Demler et al. · JAMA | 18 Jun 2003 | 8,045 |
| 25 | The Transtheoretical Model of Health Behavior Change James O. Prochaska, Wayne F. Velicer · American Journal of Health Promotion | Sep 1997 | 7,919 |
| 26 | The Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion Richard E. Petty, John T. Cacioppo · Advances in experimental social psychology | 1986 | 7,808 |
| 27 | Self‐determination theory and work motivation Marylène Gagné, Edward L. Deci · Journal of Organizational Behavior | 14 Apr 2005 | 7,722 |
| 28 | Validity of the Trail Making Test as an Indicator of Organic Brain Damage Ralph M. Reitan · Perceptual and Motor Skills | Dec 1958 | 7,715 |
| 29 | Perceived Behavioral Control, Self‐Efficacy, Locus of Control, and the Theory of Planned Behavior 1 Icek Ajzen · Journal of Applied Social Psychology | Apr 2002 | 7,619 |
| 30 | Bad is Stronger than Good Roy Frederick Baumeister, Ellen Bratslavsky, Catrin Finkenauer et al. · Review of General Psychology | Dec 2001 | 7,560 |
| 31 | You want to measure coping but your protocol’ too long: Consider the brief cope Charles S. Carver · International Journal of Behavioral Medicine | Mar 1997 | 7,423 |
| 32 | Health Promotion by Social Cognitive Means Albert Bandura · Health Education & Behavior | Apr 2004 | 7,411 |
| 33 | Confirmation Bias: A Ubiquitous Phenomenon in Many Guises Raymond S. Nickerson · Review of General Psychology | Jun 1998 | 7,302 |
| 34 | A QUANTITATIVE APPROACH TO CONTENT VALIDITY1 C. H. Lawshe · Personnel Psychology | Dec 1975 | 7,257 |
| 35 | Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and affective responses to impending reward and punishment: The BIS/BAS Scales. Charles S. Carver, Teri L. White · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | Aug 1994 | 7,173 |
| 36 | The Benefits of Frequent Positive Affect: Does Happiness Lead to Success? Sonja Lyubomirsky, Laura King, Ed Diener · Psychological Bulletin | Nov 2005 | 7,169 |
| 37 | Organizational Strategy, Structure, and Process Raymond E. Miles, Charles C. Snow, Alan D. Meyer et al. · Academy of Management Review | Jul 1978 | 7,119 |
| 38 | The standards for educational and psychological testing. Daniel R. Eignor · American Psychological Association eBooks | 2013 | 7,079 |
| 39 | A meta-analytic review of experiments examining the effects of extrinsic rewards on intrinsic motivation. Edward L. Deci, Richard Koestner, Richard M. Ryan · Psychological Bulletin | 1999 | 6,955 |
| 40 | Social Support as a Moderator of Life Stress Sidney Cobb · Psychosomatic Medicine | Sep 1976 | 6,924 |
| 41 | Social cognitive theory of self-regulation Albert Bandura · Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes | Dec 1991 | 6,843 |
| 42 | Forming inferences about some intraclass correlation coefficients. Kenneth O. McGraw, S. P. Wong · Psychological Methods | Mar 1996 | 6,836 |
| 43 | Loss, Trauma, and Human Resilience: Have We Underestimated the Human Capacity to Thrive After Extremely Aversive Events? George A. Bonanno · American Psychologist | 2004 | 6,827 |
| 44 | A Protection Motivation Theory of Fear Appeals and Attitude Change1 Ronald W. Rogers · The Journal of Psychology | Sep 1975 | 6,821 |
| 45 | Self-determination theory: A macrotheory of human motivation, development, and health. Edward L. Deci, Richard M. Ryan · Canadian Psychology/Psychologie canadienne | Aug 2008 | 6,668 |
| 46 | High Self‐Control Predicts Good Adjustment, Less Pathology, Better Grades, and Interpersonal Success June Price Tangney, Roy Frederick Baumeister, Angie Luzio Boone · Journal of Personality | 23 Feb 2004 | 6,649 |
| 47 | Construal-level theory of psychological distance. Yaacov Trope, Nira Liberman · Psychological Review | 2010 | 6,585 |
| 48 | Personality Structure: Emergence of the Five-Factor Model John M. Digman · Annual Review of Psychology | 1990 | 6,515 |
| 49 | Ecological Momentary Assessment Saul S. Shiffman, Arthur A. Stone, Michael R. Hufford · Annual Review of Clinical Psychology | 28 Nov 2007 | 6,479 |
| 50 | Implicit social cognition: Attitudes, self-esteem, and stereotypes. Anthony G. Greenwald, Mahzarin R. Banaji · Psychological Review | 1995 | 6,461 |
Citations are OpenAlex's own counts, from its 2026-09-23 snapshot, so the ranking can differ from Google Scholar or Web of Science. A paper is listed for a field when OpenAlex files it under one of the field's topics; retracted papers and papers whose citation count cannot be traced to citing works are left out, and a preprint and the article it became are shown once. Release dates are OpenAlex's: where a source gave only a month or a year, that is what is shown. How the lists are chosen.