Dangzhi Zhao and Andreas Strotmann
This study continues a long history of author co-citation analysis of the intellectual structure of information science into the time period of 2011–2020. It also examines changes…
Abstract
Purpose
This study continues a long history of author co-citation analysis of the intellectual structure of information science into the time period of 2011–2020. It also examines changes in this structure from 2006–2010 through 2011–2015 to 2016–2020. Results will contribute to a better understanding of the information science research field.
Design/methodology/approach
The well-established procedures and techniques for author co-citation analysis were followed. Full records of research articles in core information science journals published during 2011–2020 were retrieved and downloaded from the Web of Science database. About 150 most highly cited authors in each of the two five-year time periods were selected from this dataset to represent this field, and their co-citation counts were calculated. Each co-citation matrix was input into SPSS for factor analysis, and results were visualized in Pajek. Factors were interpreted as specialties and labeled upon an examination of articles written by authors who load primarily on each factor.
Findings
The two-camp structure of information science continued to be present clearly. Bibliometric indicators for research evaluation dominated the Knowledge Domain Analysis camp during both fivr-year time periods, whereas interactive information retrieval (IR) dominated the IR camp during 2011–2015 but shared dominance with information behavior during 2016–2020. Bridging between the two camps became increasingly weaker and was only provided by the scholarly communication specialty during 2016–2020. The IR systems specialty drifted further away from the IR camp. The information behavior specialty experienced a deep slump during 2011–2020 in its evolution process. Altmetrics grew to dominate the Webometrics specialty and brought it to a sharp increase during 2016–2020.
Originality/value
Author co-citation analysis (ACA) is effective in revealing intellectual structures of research fields. Most related studies used term-based methods to identify individual research topics but did not examine the interrelationships between these topics or the overall structure of the field. The few studies that did discuss the overall structure paid little attention to the effect of changes to the source journals on the results. The present study does not have these problems and continues the long history of benchmark contributions to a better understanding of the information science field using ACA.
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Dangzhi Zhao and Andreas Strotmann
Wikipedia has the lofty goal of compiling all human knowledge. The purpose of the present study is to map the structure of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) knowledge domain…
Abstract
Purpose
Wikipedia has the lofty goal of compiling all human knowledge. The purpose of the present study is to map the structure of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) knowledge domain on Wikipedia, to identify patterns of knowledge representation on Wikipedia and to test the applicability of author bibliographic coupling analysis, an effective method for mapping knowledge domains represented in published scholarly documents, for Wikipedia data.
Design/methodology/approach
We adapted and followed the well-established procedures and techniques for author bibliographic coupling analysis (ABCA). Instead of bibliographic data from a citation database, we used all articles on TCM downloaded from the English version of Wikipedia as our dataset. An author bibliographic coupling network was calculated and then factor analyzed using SPSS. Factor analysis results were visualized. Factors were labeled upon manual examination of articles that authors who load primarily in each factor have significantly contributed references to. Clear factors were interpreted as topics.
Findings
Seven TCM topic areas are represented on Wikipedia, among which Acupuncture-related practices, Falun Gong and Herbal Medicine attracted the most significant contributors to TCM. Acupuncture and Qi Gong have the most connections to the TCM knowledge domain and also serve as bridges for other topics to connect to the domain. Herbal medicine is weakly linked to and non-herbal medicine is isolated from the rest of the TCM knowledge domain. It appears that specific topics are represented well on Wikipedia but their conceptual connections are not. ABCA is effective for mapping knowledge domains on Wikipedia but document-based bibliographic coupling analysis is not.
Originality/value
Given the prominent position of Wikipedia for both information users and for researchers on knowledge organization and information retrieval, it is important to study how well knowledge is represented and structured on Wikipedia. Such studies appear largely missing although studies from different perspectives both about Wikipedia and using Wikipedia as data are abundant. Author bibliographic coupling analysis is effective for mapping knowledge domains represented in published scholarly documents but has never been applied to mapping knowledge domains represented on Wikipedia.
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Danielle A. Morris-O'Connor, Andreas Strotmann and Dangzhi Zhao
To add new empirical knowledge to debates about social practices of peer production communities, and to conversations about bias and its implications for democracy. To help…
Abstract
Purpose
To add new empirical knowledge to debates about social practices of peer production communities, and to conversations about bias and its implications for democracy. To help identify Wikipedia (WP) articles that are affected by systematic bias and hopefully help alleviate the impact of such bias on the general public, thus helping enhance both traditional (e.g. libraries) and online information services (e.g. Google) in ways that contribute to democracy. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned objectives.
Design/methodology/approach
Quantitatively, the authors identify edit-warring camps across many conflict zones of the English language WP, and profile and compare success rates and typologies of camp edits in the corresponding topic areas. Qualitatively, the authors analyze the edit war between two senior WP editors that resulted in imbalanced and biased articles throughout a topic area for such editorial characteristics through a close critical reading.
Findings
Through a large-scale quantitative study, the authors find that winner-take-all camps exhibit biasing editing behaviors to a much larger extent than the camps they successfully edit-war against, confirming findings of prior small-scale qualitative studies. The authors also confirm the employment of these behaviors and identify other behaviors in the successful silencing of traditional medicinal knowledge on WP by a scientism-biased senior WP editor through close reading.
Social implications
WP sadly does, as previously claimed, appear to be a platform that represents the biased viewpoints of its most stridently opinionated Western white male editors, and routinely misrepresents scholarly work and scientific consensus, the authors find. WP is therefore in dire need of scholarly oversight and decolonization.
Originality/value
The authors independently verify findings from prior personal accounts of highly power-imbalanced fights of scholars against senior editors on WP through a third-party close reading of a much more power balanced edit war between senior WP editors. The authors confirm that these findings generalize well to edit wars across WP, through a large scale quantitative analysis of unbalanced edit wars across a wide range of zones of contention on WP.
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Andrea Caputo, Mohammad Fakahr Manesh, Muhammad Farrukh, Reza Farzipoor Saen and Brandon Randolph-Seng
Andrea Mangani and Elisa Tarrini
The purpose of this paper is to study the empirical relationship between specialization, diversification and rate of survival in the digital publishing industry. The sample…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to study the empirical relationship between specialization, diversification and rate of survival in the digital publishing industry. The sample includes all publishing companies in Italy that produce electronic content and distribute it through internet platforms.
Design/methodology/approach
The first part of the paper discusses the pros and cons of specialization against diversification, and applies the related economic theories to the digital publishing industry. The empirical work regarding the factors that affect firm survival is reviewed. The second part is empirical and analyzes the diversification strategies of 2,838 Italian digital editors between 1995 and 2014, and the impact of diversification on the probability of survival.
Findings
On the whole, digital publishing companies that are also active in traditional print activities have been constantly declining. However, those who combine print and digital activities or operate other mass media businesses have a higher probability of surviving in the market. These findings hold controlling for firm size and market structure, before and after the economic crisis exploded in 2009, in different geographical areas and by different legal forms of publishing companies.
Research limitations/implications
As the industry often presents country-specific characteristics, the econometric analysis should also be integrated with case studies that highlight particular survival conditions.
Practical implications
The study provides mass media scholars as well as practitioners with detailed information on the digital publishing trends in the medium term.
Originality/value
This research is significant because, in the period under review, many digital native entrepreneurs with scarce experience entered the industry, targeted digital native consumers/readers and challenged traditional and established media conglomerates.
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The purpose of this study is to examine and identify the predominant themes in the literature on economic freedom. The paper also highlights the key journals, leading authors, top…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine and identify the predominant themes in the literature on economic freedom. The paper also highlights the key journals, leading authors, top countries and organisations in the literature on economic freedom.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses the Scopus database to examine 1,512 articles covering the disciplines of economics, finance, business and social sciences from 1942 to 2022. Vosviewer software is used for creating bibliometric networks.
Findings
The findings suggest that significant growth in the economic freedom literature has occurred in the last ten years. Considerable attention has been devoted to examining the relationship between economic freedom and growth. The paper also finds that most of the research on economic freedom has been undertaken in the context of developed countries.
Originality/value
This study is one of the first attempts to undertake a bibliometric analysis of economic freedom. The article also highlights the less-researched areas in the literature and thus provides directions for future research.
Peer review
The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-09-2023-0690.
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Afzal Mohammad Khaled and Yong Jin Kim
Logistical facility location decisions can make a crucial difference in the success or failure of a company. Geographical Information Systems (GIS) have recently become a very…
Abstract
Logistical facility location decisions can make a crucial difference in the success or failure of a company. Geographical Information Systems (GIS) have recently become a very popular decision support system to help deal with facility location problems. However, until recently, GIS methodologies have not been fully embraced as a way to deal with new facility location problems in business logistics. This research makes a framework for categorizing empirical facility location problems based on the intensity of the involvement of GIS methodologies in decision making. This framework was built by analyzing facility location models and GIS methodologies. The research results revealed the depth of the embracement of GIS methodologies in logistics for determining new facility location decisions. In the new facility location decisions, spatial data inputs are almost always coupled with the visualization of the problems and solutions. However, the usage of GIS capability solely (i.e. suitability analysis) for problem solving has not been embraced at the same level. In most cases, the suitability analysis is used together with special optimization models for choosing among the multiple alternatives.
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Ankit Sharma, Suresh Kumar Jakhar, Ilias Vlachos and Satish Kumar
Over the past two decades, the hub location domain has witnessed remarkable growth, yet no prior study reviewed and synthesised problem formulation and solution methodologies to…
Abstract
Purpose
Over the past two decades, the hub location domain has witnessed remarkable growth, yet no prior study reviewed and synthesised problem formulation and solution methodologies to address real-life challenges.
Design/methodology/approach
The current study conducts a comprehensive bibliometric literature review to develop a thematic framework that describes and presents hub location problems. The work employs cluster, bibliometric, and social network analyses to delve into the essential themes.
Findings
Key themes include cooperation, coopetition, sustainability, reshoring, and dynamic demand, contributing to the complex challenges in today’s hub location problems. As the first work in this field, the study serves as a valuable single-source reference, providing scholars and industry practitioners with key insights into the evolution of hub location research, prominent research clusters, influential authors, leading countries, and crucial keywords.
Research limitations/implications
Findings have significant implications since they highlight the current state of hub location research and set the stage for future endeavours. Specifically, by identifying prominent research clusters, scholars can explore promising directions to push the boundaries of knowledge in this area.
Originality/value
This work is a valuable resource for scholars in this domain and offers practical insights for industry practitioners seeking to understand the hub location problems. Overall, the study’s holistic approach provides a solid foundation for advancing future research work in the hub location field.
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Gloria Puliga, Akhatjon Nasullaev, Flavio Bono, Eugenio Gutiérrez and Fernanda Strozzi
The authors analyse the impact of European funding research programmes on the topic of Ambient Assisted Living by considering its status, future context, and the implications for…
Abstract
Purpose
The authors analyse the impact of European funding research programmes on the topic of Ambient Assisted Living by considering its status, future context, and the implications for prospective knowledge management.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors apply our variation of classical Systematic Literature Review – Systematic Literature Network Analysis, which also includes bibliographic networks – to identify the readership cliques of the associated technological publication outputs.
Findings
The authors’ main conclusion suggests that there was an increase in scientific production on AAL fields just after the start of the two EU funding programmes (2008 and 2014). Three main research directions were identified: activity and vital sign recognition, human-computer interaction and technology acceptance.
Originality/value
To date, previous reviews on Ambient Assisted Livig focus on specific aspects, such as the study of technology. The present review provides a complete overview of Ambient Assisted living technology and it grasps how the European funds have impacted on the development of this technology.