Authors
G Paolacci, J Chandler, PG Ipeirotis, J Ross, I Irani, MS Silberman, A Zaldivar, B Tomlinson
Description
In their focal article, Landers and Behrend (2015) propose to reevaluate the legitimacy of using the so-called convenience samples (eg, crowdsourcing, online panels, and student samples) as compared with traditional organizational samples in industrial–organizational (IO) psychology research. They suggest that such sampling strategies should not be judged as inappropriate per se but that decisions to accept or reject such samples must be empirically or theoretically justified. I concur with Landers and Behrend’s call for a more nuanced view on convenience samples. More precisely, I suggest that we should not “throw the baby out with the bathwater” but rather carefully and empirically examine the advantages and risks associated with using each sampling strategy before classifying it as suitable or not. In this commentary, I examine and compare original data obtained from the three types of convenience samples highlighted in the focal article:(a) crowdsourcing,(b) online panels with participants recruited by commercial panel providers, and (c) business students. I discuss differences with regards to sample composition (ie, age, gender, ethnicity, education, and