Open AccessFluctuation and evolution of research topics
Author(s) -
D. Huang
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of physics. conference series
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.21
H-Index - 85
eISSN - 1742-6596
pISSN - 1742-6588
DOI - 10.1088/1742-6596/1391/1/012098
Subject(s) - ranking (information retrieval) , similarity (geometry) , contrast (vision) , social science , sociology , political science , computer science , information retrieval , artificial intelligence , image (mathematics)
We study the shift of global research interests from 1985 to 2016. We consider the 252 research areas in Web of Science and analyse the temporal variation of their rankings. In the last three decades, science dominates over both social sciences and humanities in the high ranks. The average ranking of science continues to rise. In contrast, a decline is observed in both social sciences and humanities. A widening gap is noted between science and humanities. The shift of research interests can be observed in the continuing change of similarity between two distributions from different years. However, the Lorenz curve remains stationary in the last thirty years. The 70/30 rule can be applied, where 70% of annual publications can be attributed to 30% of research areas.