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Topic · Social Psychology

Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies

Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies is a research topic within Social Psychology. Science Explorer counts 7.8k research works in it since 1950. 10.5% of them reached the world's top 10% most cited for their field and year.

This cluster of papers explores the psychology of heroism and courage, including topics such as the nature of heroism, differentiating heroic action and altruism, workplace courage, leadership, moral education, and the role of psychological capital in fostering courage. It delves into the societal construction of heroism, the impact of gender on perceptions of heroism, and the relationship between fear, resilience, and heroic behavior.

  • Heroism
  • Courage
  • Altruism
  • Psychological Capital
  • Social Courage
  • Workplace Courage
  • Leadership
  • Moral Education
  • Positive Psychology
  • Humanistic Psychology
Research works
7.8k
fractional, since 1950
In the world top 10%
817
per year above
Top-10% rate
10.5%
share of its works in the world top 10%
Growth, 2018-21 → 2022-25
+76%
the tick is no change
Largest producer
United States
53% of the 10 largest, 2022-now
Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies

Which countries lead Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research?

By volume, the United States and India publish the most (975 and 151 works in 2022-now).

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 United States 975 works
  2. 2 India 151 works
  3. 3 China 145 works
  4. 4 United Kingdom 120 works
  5. 5 Indonesia 96 works
  6. 6 Canada 82 works
  7. 7 Türkiye 80 works
  8. 8 Australia 69 works
  9. 9 Russia 54 works
  10. 10 Nigeria 53 works

How concentrated that is

The same countries as shares of everything the list above accounts for. A node where two countries do two thirds of the work and one spread evenly across twelve read alike as a ranking and not at all alike here.

United States: 53.4%India: 8.2%China: 7.9%United Kingdom: 6.6%6 others listed: 23.8%53%largest
United States975 · 53.4%India151 · 8.2%China145 · 7.9%United Kingdom120 · 6.6%6 others listed435 · 23.8%

Shares of the rows listed above, not of the whole node.

Which institutions lead Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research?

By volume in 2022-now, University of Richmond publishes the most Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research, followed by University of Louisville and Carleton University.

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 University of RichmondUnited States 283 works
  2. 2 University of LouisvilleUnited States 182 works
  3. 3 Carleton UniversityCanada 16 works
  4. 4 University of LimerickIreland 13 works
  5. 5 Duke UniversityUnited States 8 works
  6. 6 Tribhuvan UniversityNepal 8 works
  7. 7 Islamic Azad University, TehranIran 7 works
  8. 8 City University of New YorkUnited States 7 works
  9. 9 Claremont CollegesUnited States 6 works
  10. 10 Jagiellonian UniversityPoland 6 works

Who are the leading researchers in Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies?

The most-cited researchers publishing on Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies include Albert Bandura, Michael C. Jensen and Trevor William Robbins.

  1. 1 Albert Bandura United States 370k citations
  2. 2 Michael C. Jensen United States 203k citations
  3. 3 Trevor William Robbins United Kingdom 199k citations
  4. 4 Roy Frederick Baumeister United States 183k citations

Ranked by citations received across their whole record, among researchers with at least three works on this topic.

What are the most cited papers in Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies?

The most cited paper in Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies is "The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions." (Barbara L. Fredrickson, 2001), with 14,780 citations. Next come "Essentials of Psychological Testing" (4,559) and "The need for and meaning of positive organizational behavior" (3,025).

Most cited papers
#PaperReleasedCitations
1 The role of positive emotions in positive psychology: The broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions. Barbara L. Fredrickson · American Psychologist Open access Mar 2001 14,780
2 Essentials of Psychological Testing Benjamin Rosner, Lee J. Cronbach · The American Journal of Psychology Jun 1960 4,559
3 The need for and meaning of positive organizational behavior Fred Luthans · Journal of Organizational Behavior Open access 15 Jul 2002 3,025
4 Unlocking the mask: a look at the process by which authentic leaders impact follower attitudes and behaviors Bruce J. Avolio, William L. Gardner, Fred Ochieng Walumbwa et al. · The Leadership Quarterly 12 Nov 2004 2,265
5 Resilience in the Face of Catastrophe: Optimism, Personality, and Coping in the Kosovo Crisis Laura T. Riolli, Victor Savicki, Ariana Cepani · Journal of Applied Social Psychology Aug 2002 2,166
All 99 most cited papers, with filters and sorting

Where is Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research done?

The largest centres of Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research in 2022-now are Richmond (United States), Louisville (United States), London (United Kingdom) and Moscow (Russia). Among places with at least 20 works in it, it is an unusually large share of all research in Richmond, Louisville and Ottawa.

Largest cities, 2022-now

  1. 1 RichmondUnited States 288 works
  2. 2 LouisvilleUnited States 182 works
  3. 3 LondonUnited Kingdom 29 works
  4. 4 MoscowRussia 25 works
  5. 5 BeijingChina 25 works
  6. 6 New YorkUnited States 25 works
  7. 7 OttawaCanada 20 works
  8. 8 IstanbulTürkiye 15 works
  9. 9 JakartaIndonesia 14 works
  10. 10 LimerickIreland 12 works

Where it is the local speciality

  1. RichmondUS · 287.6 works212×
  2. LouisvilleUS · 182.1 works212×
  3. OttawaCA · 20.3 works4.8×
← less than its size predicts1×more →

Location quotient: how much more of its research is in Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies than the world average.

See Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies on the map

Where is the best place to study Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies?

Among universities, judged by research, University of Limerick, University of Richmond and University of Louisville score highest, combining citation excellence, specialisation, size, growth and international reach. Research strength is one signal when choosing where to study; it does not measure teaching.

0%20%40%mean 15.2833%fractional works in this field (log) →share of work in the world top 10% →University of LimerickDuke UniversityUniversity of RichmondUniversity of Louisv…
above the meannear itbelow it

One dot per university in the first ten of the table below, at the default weights. The upper left is the interesting corner: small places doing unusually strong work.

Citation excellenceshare of its work in the world top 10%, 2022-now and all time averaged
40%
Specialisationhow much of its work is in this field, counted up to 10× the world share
10%
Sizeits output in this field, on a log scale
30%
Growthoutput growth, counted from -20% to +20%
10%
Internationalshare of its work with a co-author abroad
10%
Each slider sets a weight; the share it gets of the score is beside it.
#UniversityScoreTop 10%SpecialisationWorksGrowth
1University of LimerickIreland 73.842.7%29.6×13 +776.9%
2University of RichmondUnited States 58.59.5%1558.5×283 +2704.4%
3University of LouisvilleUnited States 56.99.2%298.9×182 +10820.0%
4Duke UniversityUnited States 36.330.0%4.5×8 -
5Carleton UniversityCanada 30.50.0%25.6×16 -
6Tribhuvan UniversityNepal 16.80.3%4.8×8 +242.9%

Universities only. The score blends citation excellence (40%), size (30%), specialisation (10%), growth (10%), international reach (10%), 2022-now; growth compares 2018-21 with 2022-25 and counts up to +20%, since a jump from a small base is mostly noise.

Every institution in Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies, country by country

Is Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies research growing?

Output in 2022-2025 was 76% higher than in 2018-2021, peaking in 2024. The fastest-growing topics are Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies.

still counting19801990200020102020
grewheldshrank

The same series as a ribbon: one cell per year, darker for more. The line above answers how much; this answers when.

Its share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share: all of science grows. This is Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies as a percentage of every work published that year, 0.018% in 2024.

still counting0.010%0.020%Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies0.0079% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works of Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

Year by year.

still counting5%10%15%Leadership, Courage, and Heroism Studies10.8% in 2025200020102020

Of each year's works in it, the share that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. A field is the world for its own topics, so there is no other line to hold it against.

Which topics inside it are moving

Growth and decline on one axis around a shared zero. Two lists side by side hide the thing that matters: whether the growth dwarfs the decline, or the other way round.

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