Beyond High And Low: Obstacles And Opportunities Associated With Conceptualizing Middle Power And Other Middle-Range Effects

Researchers disproportionately develop and test research questions aimed at understanding the effects of extreme-compared to intermediate or fluctuating-positions and states. Commonly applied theoretical frameworks and methodological tools reflect and serve to perpetuate this binary focus on extreme effects. Here, I attempt to lay the foundation for researchers to more rigorously and consistently study middle-range effects in the psychological sciences in general and in the social power literature in particular. In proposing three different conceptualizations of "middle power,"-power fluctuation, power tension, and medium power-I identify theoretical and methodological obstacles and opportunities related to studying middle power. Overall, I argue that the landscape between a construct's poles is neither vacuous nor hypothetical space. Rather, it is potentially fertile, yet largely unharvested, scholarly terrain. Simply put, the middle matters, and deserves greater attention.