Marcus Dickson

Marcus Dickson

Marcus W. Dickson is professor of industrial/organizational psychology at Wayne State University in Detroit. Dr. Dickson completed his graduate education at the University of Maryland, following his undergraduate education at West Virginia Wesleyan College. Dr. Dickson’s research interests focus on leadership, especially in a cross-cultural context, and he served as Co-Principal Investigator on Project GLOBE, the largest cross-cultural study of leadership conducted to date.

His work has appeared in major research outlets, including Journal of Applied Psychology, The Leadership Quarterly, Advances in Global Leadership, Sex Roles, and Applied Psychology: An International Review, among others, and has been cited over 13,000 times. He also served as Co-PI on a $1.8M grant through the National Institutes on Drug Abuse, examining leadership and culture issues affecting the efficacy of research trials in substance abuse treatment centers. A noted teacher, he has been recognized for teaching excellence by the University of Maryland, Wayne State University (the President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching (2x), as well as the Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award), and the Society for I/O Psychology (the Distinguished Contributions in Teaching Award).

Dr. Dickson has taught at the undergraduate, master’s, executive master’s, and doctoral levels in the US, as well as internationally, including teaching in Taiwan, Singapore, Germany, and Ireland. He is the founder and director of the Applied Psychology and Organizational Research Group (APORG), a unit within the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wayne State that provides training to I/O psychology graduate students through applied research and consulting projects. APORG has generated over $1,800,000 in contracts and research assistantships to date. He is also the director of the terminal master's degree program in I/O Psychology at Wayne State. Dr. Dickson and his wife, Heather, have one son, Michael. When not working on teaching, research, or consulting, Dr. Dickson can usually be found either playing or researching 19th-century baseball.

Research interest(s)/area of expertise

 Organizational leadership; cross-cultural issues in organizations; personnel selection; discrimination in hiring;  Team decision-making and performance

Education

• Ph.D. in I/O Psychology, University of Maryland, 1997
• M.A. in I/O Psychology, University of Maryland, 1994
• B.A. in Psychology, West Virginia Wesleyan College, 1988

Awards and grants

Grants

• Over $2,000,000 in applied research/consulting contracts and internships through APORG
• Investigating current measurement and aggregation controversies in the cross-cultural organizational literature. Society for Industrial-Organizational Psychology International Research Collaboration Grant (PI). 2016-2017. $3,500
• Organization Processes in Treatment Programs. (Co-PI; Principal Investigator is C. Arfken). National Institutes for Drug Abuse. 8/01-8/06. $1,492,000 in total costs
• Advanced Information Technologies in Industrial, Healthcare, and Community Contexts: Organizational Learning in the Implementation of Information Systems in an Integrated Health Care System. (Principal Investigator). Wayne State University’s Research Enhancement Program. 8/98-12/00. $80,000
• Video-based communication in decision-making teams. (Principal Investigator). Wayne State University’s Small Research Grants Program. 8/00-8/01. $1,000

Awards

• Outstanding Graduate Director Award, 2022
• WSU Academy of Teachers
• President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching, Wayne State University, 2005, 2019
• Elected as Fellow of the Society for I-O Psychology (Division 14 of the American Psychology Association), 2016
• Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award, Wayne State University, 2015
• Distinguished Contributions in Teaching Award, awarded to one person annually by the Society for Industrial/Organizational Psychology (Division 14 of the American Psychological Association), 2005
• Award for Excellence in Teaching, College of Science, Wayne State University, 1999 – 2000
• Award for Excellence in Teaching (Graduate Student), College of Behavioral and Social Sciences, University of Maryland, 1997
• University of Maryland Graduate School Fellowship, 1991 – 93

Selected publications

• Thrasher, G., Biermeier-Hanson, B., Dickson, M.W., & Najor-Durack, A. (2020). Social identity theory and leader–member exchange: individual, dyadic and situational factors affecting the relationship between leader–member exchange and job performance. Organization Management Journal, 17(3), 133-152
• Lee, P. J., Rainone, N. A., Aiken, J. R., Dickson, M. W., Scherbaum, C. A., Chen, T., & Hanges, P. J. (2020). Where Are They Now? Re-Examining the Migration of I-O Psychologists to Business Schools. The Industrial-Organizational Psychologist, 57. (online)
• Thrasher, G., Biermeier-Hanson, B., & Dickson, M. W. (2019). Getting Old at the Top: The Role of Emotion Regulation and Positivity in the Relationship between Age, Leadership Behaviors, and Follower-Rated Leader Effectiveness. Work, Aging and Retirement, waz012, https://doi.org/10.1093/workar/waz012
• Mathur, A., Cano, A., Dickson, M.W., Matherly, L.H., Maun, C., & Neale, A. V. (2019). Portfolio Review in Graduate Admissions: Outcomes of a Pilot Program. Strategic Enrollment Management Quarterly, 7(1), 7-24
• Scherbaum, C., Dickson, M. W., Yusko, K., & Goldstein, H. (2018). Creating Test Score Bands for Assessments Involving Ratings using a Generalizability Theory Approach to Reliability Estimation. Personnel Assessment and Decisions, 4, 1-8
• Dickson, M. W., Resick, C. J., & Hanges, P. J. (2006). When organizational climate is unambiguous, it is also strong. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91, 351-364
• Dickson, M. W., Lelchook, A., Sully DeLuque, M., & Hanges, P. J. (2012). Project GLOBE: Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Education. In S. Snook, N. Nohria, & R. Khurana (Eds.), The Handbook for Teaching Leadership: Knowing, Doing, and Being (pp. 433-452). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Citation index

• H-index of 34, according to Google Scholar (January 2024)
• i-10 index of 47, according to Google Scholar (January 2024)
• 17,000+ citations, according to Google Scholar (January 2024)

Courses taught by Marcus Dickson

Winter Term 2025 (future)

• PSY7470 - Interdisciplinary Research Methods in Social, Cognitive and Developmental Psychology
• PSY7500 - Research Methods in Industrial/Organizational Psychology
• PSY8500 - Seminar in Industrial/Organizational Psychology

Spring-Summer Term 2024

• PSY7790 - Capstone Course

Winter Term 2024

• PSY2020 - Research Methods In Psychology
• PSY6570 - Research Methods in Industrial/Organizational Psychology
• PSY7520 - Selection and Placement: Theory and Research

Fall Term 2023

• PSY1010 - Introductory Psychology

Spring-Summer Term 2023

• PSY7790 - Capstone Course

Winter Term 2023

• PSY1010 - Introductory Psychology

Fall Term 2022

• PSY1010 - Introductory Psychology

Spring-Summer Term 2022

• PSY7790 - Capstone Course

Winter Term 2022

• PSY6570 - Research Methods in Industrial/Organizational Psychology
• PSY7560 - Leadership and Executive Development: Theory and Research