Special issue: Dynamic viewpoints on Implicit Leadership and Followership Theories Roseanne Foti a , Tiffany Keller Hansbrough b , Olga Epitropaki c,d , Patrick Coyle e a Virginia Tech, USA b Fairleigh Dickinson University, USA c ALBA Graduate Business School at the American College of Greece, Greece d Aston University, UK e Virginia Tech, USA Research on Implicit Leadership Theories (e.g., ILTs, Lord, Foti, & De Vader, 1984; Lord & Maher, 1991) spans over thirty years and has offered significant insights into our understanding of leadership perceptions. Recently, a new and exciting field of research, Implicit Followership Theories (e.g., Shondrick & Lord, 2010; Sy, 2010), has infused the field with new vigor. Whereas ILT research originally utilized categorization theory (Rosch, 1978) as the main theoretical foundation and focused mainly on prototype matching processes, more recent perspectives (e.g., Hanges, Lord, & Dickson, 2000; Lord, Brown, & Harvey, 2001; Lord & Shondrick, 2011; O'Malley, Ritchie, Lord, Gregory, & Young, 2009) have attempted to capture the inherently dynamic and complex nature of leadership and followership prototypes. Such perspectives allow for the possibility that ILTs/IFTs are not static and change may take place at the individual, relational, or organizational level of analysis. To that end, the aim of this special issue is to capture recent theoretical and empirical developments in Implicit Leadership and Followership Theories and address some of the following questions: • Which theoretical advancements has the field undergone in recent years? For example, how can theories from other disciplines (such as catastrophe theory, the person perception literature, and identity theory) inform our understanding of the dynamic nature of implicit leadership and followership schemas? • What do new studies reveal about the content of ILTs and IFTs in multi-cultural, diverse contexts? Are leadership and followership schemas bounded by organizational and national contexts? • Does the traditional measurement of ILTs and IFTs using trait-lists sufficiently capture the implicit, or off-line processing, implied by ILTs/IFTs? How might exciting new methodologies such as simulations, and implicit and physiological measures help us deepen our understanding of implicit phenomena such as ILTs and IFTs? • What key insights on leadership perceptions can we draw from pattern-oriented approaches? Do patterns of ILTs and IFTs predict leader and follower outcomes better than do their individual dimensions? • How does a match in ILTs and IFTs impact proximal and distal outcomes in organizational settings, such as leader–follower relationships, job attitudes and performance? • What are the key antecedents of ILTs and IFTs in applied settings? • How do ILTs and IFTs change over time? Which patterns of change can we observe in narrow time spans (e.g., diary studies) vs. longer time spans (e.g., from youth to late adulthood)? • What is the role of emotion and affective processes for ILT and IFT activation and change over time? • What are the implications of ILTs and IFTs for leadership emergence in team settings? • How do ILTs and IFTs prime leader and follower identities and views of self as a leader or follower? In what ways might organizations shape leader identity and ILTs/IFTs to foster leadership development? The Leadership Quarterly 25 (2014) 411–412 E-mail addresses: rfoti@vt.edu (R. Foti), thansb@fdu.edu (T.K. Hansbrough), oepitrop@alba.edu.gr (O. Epitropaki), Coylep23@gmail.com (P. Coyle). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect The Leadership Quarterly journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/leaqua http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.leaqua.2014.02.004