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Home > Books > Qualitative versus Quantitative Research

Research Methods in Library and Information Science

Submitted: 28 October 2016 Reviewed: 23 March 2017 Published: 28 June 2017

DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.68749

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Library and information science (LIS) is a very broad discipline, which uses a wide rangeof constantly evolving research strategies and techniques. The aim of this chapter is to provide an updated view of research issues in library and information science. A stratified random sample of 440 articles published in five prominent journals was analyzed and classified to identify (i) research approach, (ii) research methodology, and (iii) method of data analysis. For each variable, a coding scheme was developed, and the articles were coded accordingly. A total of 78% of the articles reported empirical research. The rest 22% were classified as non‐empirical research papers. The five most popular topics were “information retrieval,” “information behaviour,” “information literacy,” “library services,” and “organization and management.” An overwhelming majority of the empirical research articles employed a quantitative approach. Although the survey emerged as the most frequently used research strategy, there is evidence that the number and variety of research methodologies have been increased. There is also evidence that qualitative approaches are gaining increasing importance and have a role to play in LIS, while mixed methods have not yet gained enough recognition in LIS research.

• library and information science
• research methods
• research strategies
• data analysis techniques
• research articles

Author Information

Aspasia togia *.

• Department of Library Science & Information Systems, Technological Educational Institute (TEI) of Thessaloniki, Greece

Afrodite Malliari

• DataScouting, Thessaloniki, Greece

*Address all correspondence to: [email protected]

1. Introduction

Library and information science (LIS), as its name indicates, is a merging of librarianship and information science that took place in the 1960s [ 1 , 2 ]. LIS is a field of both professional practice and scientific inquiry. As a field of practice, it includes the profession of librarianship as well as a number of other information professions, all of which assume the interplay of the following:

information content,

the people who interact with the content, and

the technology used to facilitate the creation, communication, storage, or transformation of the content [ 3 ].

The disciplinary foundation of LIS, which began in the 1920s, aimed at providing a theoretical foundation for the library profession. LIS has evolved in close relationship with other fields of research, especially computer science, communication studies, and cognitive sciences [ 4 ].

The connection of LIS with professional practice, on one hand, and other research fields on the other has influenced its research orientation and the development of methodological tools and theoretical perspectives [ 5 ]. Research problems are diverse, depending on the research direction, local trends, etc. Most of them relate to the professional practice although there are theoretical research statements as well. LIS research strives to address important information issues, such as these of “ information retrieval, information quality and authenticity, policy for access and preservation, the health and security applications of data mining ”(p. 3) [ 6 ]. The research is multidisciplinary in nature, and it has been heavily influenced by research designs developed in the social, behavioral, and management sciences and to a lesser extent by the theoretical inquiry adopted in the humanities [ 7 ]. Methods used in information retrieval research have been adapted from computer science. The emergence of evidence‐based librarianship in the late 1990s brought a positivist approach to LIS research, since it incorporated many of the research designs and methods used in clinical medicine [ 7 , 8 ]. In addition, LIS has developed its own methodological approaches, a prominent example of which is bibliometrics. Bibliometrics, which can be defined as “ the use of mathematical and statistical methods to study documents and patterns of publication ” (p. 38) [ 9 ], is a native research methodology, which has been extensively used outside the field, especially in science studies [ 10 ].

Library and information science research has been often criticized as being fragmentary, narrowly focused, and oriented to practical problems [ 11 ]. Many authors have noticed limited use of theory in published research and have advocated greater use of theory as a conceptual basis in LIS research [ 4 , 11 – 14 ]. Feehan et al. [ 13 ] claimed that LIS literature has not evolved enough to support a rigid body of its own theoretical basis. Jarvelin and Vakkari [ 15 ] argued that LIS theories are usually vague and conceptually unclear, and that research in LIS has been dominated by a paradigm which “ has made little use of such traditional scientific approaches as foundations and conceptual analysis, or of scientific explanation and theory formulation ” (p. 415). This lack of theoretical contributions may be associated with the fact that LIS emanated from professional practice and is therefore closely linked to practical problems such as the processing and organization of library materials, documentation, and information retrieval [ 15 , 16 ].

In this chapter, after briefly discussing the role of theory in LIS research, we provide an updated view of research issues in the field that will help scholars and students stay informed about topics related to research strategies and methods. To accomplish this, we describe and analyze patterns of LIS research activity as reflected in prominent library journals. The analysis of the articles highlights trends and recurring themes in LIS research regarding the use of multiple methods, the adoption of qualitative approaches, and the employment of advanced techniques for data analysis and interpretation [ 17 ].

2. The role of theory in LIS research

The presence of theory is an indication of research eminence and respectability [ 18 ], as well as a feature of discipline’s maturity [ 19 , 20 ]. Theory has been defined in many ways. “ Any of the following have been used as the meaning of theory: a law, a hypothesis, group of hypotheses, proposition, supposition, explanation, model, assumption, conjecture, construct, edifice, structure, opinion, speculation, belief, principle, rule, point of view, generalization, scheme, or idea ” (p. 309) [ 21 ]. A theory can be described as “ a set of interrelated concepts, definitions, and propositions that explains or predicts events or situations by specifying relations among variables ” [ 22 ]. According to Babbie [ 23 ], research is “ a systematic explanation for the observed facts and laws that related to a particular aspect of life ” (p. 49). It is “ a multiple‐level component of the research process, comprising a range of generalizations that move beyond a descriptive level to a more explanatory level ” [ 24 ] (p. 319). The role of theory in social sciences is, among other things, to explain and predict behavior, be usable in practical applications, and guide research [ 25 ]. According to Smiraglia [ 26 ], theory does not exist in a vacuum but in a system that explains the domains of human actions, the phenomena found in these domains, and the ways in which they are affected. He maintains that theory is developed by systematically observing phenomena, either in the positivist empirical research paradigm or in the qualitative hermeneutic paradigm. Theory is used to formulate hypotheses in quantitative research and confirms observations in qualitative research.

Glazier and Grover [ 24 ] proposed a model for theory‐building in LIS called “circuits of theory.” The model includes taxonomy of theory, developed earlier by the authors [ 11 ], and the critical social and psychological factors that influence research. The purpose of the taxonomy was to demonstrate the relationships among the concepts of research, theory, paradigms, and phenomena. Phenomena are described as “ events experienced in the empirical world ” (p. 230) [ 11 ]. Researchers assign symbols (digital or iconic representations, usually words or pictures) to phenomena, and meaning to symbols, and then they conceptualize the relationships among phenomena and formulate hypotheses and research questions. “ In the taxonomy, empirical research begins with the formation of research questions to be answered about the concepts or hypotheses for testing the concepts within a narrow set of predetermined parameters ” (p. 323) [ 24 ]. Various levels of theories, with implications for research in library and information Science, are described. The first theory level, called substantive theory , is defined as “ a set of propositions which furnish an explanation for an applied area of inquiry ” (p. 233) [ 11 ]. In fact, it may not be viewed as a theory but rather be considered as a research hypothesis that has been tested or even a research finding [ 16 ]. The next level of theory, called formal theory , is defined as “ a set of propositions which furnish an explanation for a formal or conceptual area of inquiry, that is, a discipline ” (p. 234) [ 11 ]. Substantive and formal theories together are usually considered as “middle range” theory in the social sciences. Their difference lies in the ability to structure generalizations and the potential for explanation and prediction. The final level, grand theory , is “ a set of theories or generalizations that transcend the borders of disciplines to explain relationships among phenomena ” (p. 321) [ 24 ]. According to the authors, most research generates substantive level theory, or, alternatively, researchers borrow theory from the appropriate discipline, apply it to the problem under investigation, and reconstruct the theory at the substantive level. Next in the hierarchy of theoretical categories is the paradigm , which is described as “ a framework of basic assumptions with which perceptions are evaluated and relationships are delineated and applied to a discipline or profession ” (p. 234) [ 11 ]. Finally, the most significant theoretical category is the world view , which is defined as “ an individual’s accepted knowledge, including values and assumptions, which provide a ‘filter’ for perception of all phenomena ” (p. 235) [ 11 ]. All the previous categories contribute to shaping the individual’s worldview. In the revised model, which places more emphasis on the impact of social environment on the research process, research and theory building is surrounded by a system of three basic contextual modules: the self, society, and knowledge, both discovered and undiscovered. The interactions and dialectical relationships of these three modules affect the research process and create a dynamic environment that fosters theory creation and development. The authors argue that their model will help researchers build theories that enable generalizations beyond the conclusions drawn from empirical data [ 24 ].

In an effort to propose a framework for a unified theory of librarianship, McGrath [ 27 ] reviewed research articles in the areas of publishing, acquisitions, classification and knowledge organization, storage, preservation and collection management, library collections, and circulations. In his study, he included articles that employed explanatory and predictive statistical methods to explore relationships between variables within and between the above subfields of LIS. For each paper reviewed, he identified the dependent variable, significant independent variables, and the units of analysis. The review displayed explanatory studies “ in nearly every level, with the possible exception of classification, while studies in circulation and use of the library were clearly dominant. A recapitulation showed that a variable at one level may be a unit of analysis at another, a property of explanatory research crucial to the development of theory, which has been either ignored or unrecognized in LIS literature ” (p. 368) [ 27 ]. The author concluded that “explanatory and predictive relationships do exist and that they can be useful in constructing a comprehensive unified theory of librarianship” (p. 368) [ 27 ].

Recent LIS literature provides several analyses of theory development and use in the field. In a longitudinal analysis of information needs and uses of literature, Julien and Duggan [ 28 ] investigated, among other things, to what extent LIS literature was grounded in theory. Articles “ based on a coherent and explicit framework of assumptions, definitions, and propositions that, taken together, have some explanatory power ” (p. 294) were classified as theoretical articles. Results showed that only 18.3% of the research studies identified in the sample of articles examined were theoretically grounded.

Pettigrew and McKechnie [ 29 ] analyzed 1160 journal articles published between 1993 and 1998 to determine the level of theory use in information science research. In the absence of a singular definition of theory that would cover all the different uses of the term in the sample of articles, they operationalized “theory” according to authors’ use of the term. They found that 34.1% of the articles incorporated theory, with the largest percentage of theories drawn from the social sciences. Information science itself was the second most important source of theories. The authors argued that this significant increase in theory use in comparison to earlier studies could be explained by the research‐oriented journals they selected for examination, the sample time, and the broad way in which they defined “theory.” With regard to this last point, that is, their approach of identifying theories only if the author(s) describe them as such in the article, Pettigrew and McKechnie [ 29 ] observed significant differences in how information science researchers perceive theory:

Although it is possible that conceptual differences regarding the nature of theory may be due to the different disciplinary backgrounds of researchers in IS, other themes emerged from our data that suggest a general confusion exists about theory even within subfields. Numerous examples came to light during our analysis in which an author would simultaneously refer to something as a theory and a method, or as a theory and a model, or as a theory and a reported finding. In other words, it seems as though authors, themselves, are sometimes unsure about what constitutes theory. Questions even arose regarding whether the author to whom a theory was credited would him or herself consider his or her work as theory (p. 68).

Kim and Jeong [ 16 ] examined the state and characteristics of theoretical research in LIS journals between 1984 and 2003. They focused on the “theory incident,” which is described as “an event in which the author contributes to the development or the use of theory in his/her paper.” Their study adopted Glazier and Grover’s [ 24 ] model of “circuits of theory.” Substantive level theory was operationalized to a tested hypothesis or an observed relationship, while both formal and grand level theories were identified when they were named as “theory,” “model,” or “law” by authors other than those who had developed them. Results demonstrated that the application of theory was present in 41.4% of the articles examined, signifying a significant increase in the proportion of theoretical articles as compared to previous studies. Moreover, it was evident that both theory development and theory use had increased by the year. Information seeking and use, and information retrieval, were identified as the subfields with the most significant contribution to the development of the theoretical framework.

In a more in‐depth analysis of theory use in Kumasi et al. [ 30 ] qualitatively analyzed the extent to which theory is meaningfully used in scholarly literature. For this purpose, they developed a theory talk coding scheme, which included six analytical categories, describing how theory is discussed in a study. The intensity of theory talk in the articles was described across a continuum from minimal (e.g., theory is discussed in literature review and not mentioned later) through moderate (e.g., multiple theories are introduced but without discussing their relevance to the study) to major (e.g., theory is employed throughout the study). Their findings seem to support the opinion that “ LIS discipline has been focused on the application of specific theoretical frameworks rather than the generation of new theories ” (p. 179) [ 30 ]. Another point the authors made was about the multiple terms used in the articles to describe theory. Words such as “framework,” “model,” or “theory” were used interchangeably by scholars.

It is evident from the above discussion that the treatment of theory in LIS research covers a spectrum of intensity, from marginal mentions to theory revising, expanding, or building. Recent analyses of the published scholarship indicate that the field has not been very successful in contributing to existing theory or producing new theory. In spite of this, one may still assert that LIS research employs theory, and, in fact, there are many theories that have been used or generated by LIS scholars. However, “ calls for additional and novel theory development work in LIS continue, particularly for theories that might help to address the research practice gap ” (p. 12) [ 31 ].

3. Research strategies in LIS

3.1. surveys of research methods.

LIS is a very broad discipline, which uses a wide range of constantly evolving research strategies and techniques [ 32 ]. Various classification schemes have been developed to analyze methods employed in LIS research (e.g., [ 13 , 15 , 17 , 33 – 35 , 38 ]). Back in 1996, in the “research record” column of the Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, Kim [ 36 ] synthesized previous categories and definitions and introduced a list of research strategies, including data collection and analysis methods. The listing included four general research strategies: (i) theoretical/philosophical inquiry (development of conceptual models or frameworks), (ii) bibliographic research (descriptive studies of books and their properties as well as bibliographies of various kinds), (iii) R&D (development of storage and retrieval systems, software, interface, etc.), and (iv) action research, it aims at solving problems and bringing about change in organizations. Strategies are then divided into quantitative and qualitative driven. In the first category are included descriptive studies, predictive/explanatory studies, bibliometric studies, content analysis, and operation research studies. Qualitative‐driven strategies are considered the following: case study, biographical method, historical method, grounded theory, ethnography, phenomenology, symbolic interactionism/semiotics, sociolinguistics/discourse analysis/ethnographic semantics/ethnography of communication, and hermeneutics/interpretive interactionism (p. 378–380) [ 36 ].

Systematic studies of research methods in LIS started in the 1980s and several reviews of the literature have been conducted over the past years to analyze the topics, methodologies, and quality of research. One of the earliest studies was done by Peritz [ 37 ] who carried out a bibliometric analysis of the articles published in 39 core LIS journals between 1950 and 1975. She examined the methodologies used, the type of library or organization investigated, the type of activity investigated, and the institutional affiliation of the authors. The most important findings were a clear orientation toward library and information service activities, a widespread use of the survey methodology, a considerable increase of research articles after 1960, and a significant increase in theoretical studies after 1965.

Nour [ 38 ] followed up on Peritz’s [ 37 ] work and studied research articles published in 41 selected journals during the year 1980. She found that survey and theoretical/analytic methodologies were the most popular, followed by bibliometrics. Comparing these findings to those made by Peritz [ 37 ], Nour [ 38 ] found that the amount of research continued to increase, but the proportion of research articles to all articles had been decreasing since 1975.

Feehan et al. [ 13 ] described how LIS research published during 1984 was distributed over various topics and what methods had been used to study these topics. Their analysis revealed a predominance of survey and historical methods and a notable percentage of articles using more than one research method. Following a different approach, Enger et al. (1989) focused on the statistical methods used by LIS researchers in articles published during 1985 [ 39 ]. They found that only one out of three of the articles reported any use of statistics. Of those, 21% used descriptive statistics and 11% inferential statistics. In addition, the authors found that researchers from disciplines other than LIS made the highest use of statistics and LIS faculty showed the highest use of inferential statistics.

An influential work, against which later studies have been compared, is that of Jarvelin and Vakkari [ 15 ] who studied LIS articles published in 1985 in order to determine how research was distributed over various subjects, what approaches had been taken by the authors, and what research strategies had been used. The authors replicated their study later to include older research published between 1965 and 1985 [ 40 ]. The main finding of these studies was that the trends and characteristics of LIS research remained more or less the same over the aforementioned period of 20 years. The most common topics were information service activities and information storage and retrieval. Empirical research strategies were predominant, and of them, the most frequent was the survey. Kumpulainen [ 41 ], in an effort to provide a continuum with Jarvelin and Vakkeri’s [ 15 ] study, analyzed 632 articles sampled from 30 core LIS journals with respect to various characteristics, including topics, aspect of activity, research method, data selection method, and data analysis techniques. She used the same classification scheme, and she selected the journals based on a slightly modified version of Jarvelin and Vakkari’s [ 15 ] list. Library services and information storage and retrieval emerged again as the most common subjects approached by the authors and survey was the most frequently used method.

More recent studies of this nature include those conducted by Koufogiannakis et al. [ 42 ], Hildreth and Aytac [ 43 ], Hider and Pymm [ 32 ], and Chu [ 17 ]. Koufogiannakis et al. [ 42 ] examined research articles published in 2001 and they found that the majority of them were questionnaire‐based descriptive studies. Comparative, bibliometrics, content analysis, and program evaluation studies were also popular. Information storage and retrieval emerged as the predominant subject area, followed by library collections and management. Hildreth and Aytac [ 43 ] presented a review of the 2003–2005 published library research with special focus on methodology issues and the quality of published articles of both practitioners and academic scholars. They found that most research was descriptive and the most frequent method for data collection was the questionnaire, followed by content analysis and interviews. With regard to data analysis, more researchers used quantitative methods, considerably less used qualitative‐only methods, whereas 61 out of 206 studies included some kind of qualitative analysis, raising the total percentage of qualitative methods to nearly 50%. With regard to the quality of published research, the authors argued that “ the majority of the reports are detailed, comprehensive, and well‐organized ” (p. 254) [ 43 ]. Still, they noticed that the majority of reports did not mention the critical issues of research validity and reliability and neither did they indicate study limitations or future research recommendations. Hider and Pymm [ 32 ] described content analysis of LIS literature “ which aimed to identify the most common strategies and techniques employed by LIS researchers carrying out high‐profile empirical research ” (p. 109). Their results suggested that while researchers employed a wide variety of strategies, they mostly used surveys and experiments. They also observed that although quantitative research accounted for more than 50% of the articles, there was an increase in the use of most sophisticated qualitative methods. Chu [ 17 ] analyzed the research articles published between 2001 and 2010 in three major journals and reported the following most frequent research methods: theoretical approach (e.g., conceptual analysis), content analysis, questionnaire, interview, experiment, and bibliometrics. Her study showed an increase in both the number and variety of research methods but lack of growth in the use of qualitative research or in the adoption of multiple research methods.

In summary, the literature shows a continued interest in the analysis of published LIS research. Approaches include focusing on particular publication years, geographic areas, journal titles, aspects of LIS, and specific characteristics, such as subjects, authorship, and research methods. Despite the abundance of content analyses of LIS literature, the findings are not easily comparable due to differences in the number and titles of journals examined, in the types of the papers selected for analysis, in the periods covered, and in classification schemes developed by the authors to categorize article topics and research strategies. Despite the differences, some findings are consistent among all studies:

Information seeking, information retrieval, and library and information service activities are among the most common subjects studied,

Descriptive research methodologies based on surveys and questionnaires predominate,

Over the years, there has been a considerable increase in the array of research approaches used to explore library issues, and

Data analysis is usually limited to descriptive statistics, including frequencies, means, and standard deviations.

3.2. Data collection and analysis

Articles published between 2011 and 2016 were obtained from the following journals: Library and Information Science Research, College & Research Libraries, Journal of Documentation, Information Processing & Management, and Journal of Academic Librarianship ( Table 1 ). These five titles were selected as data sources because they have the highest 5‐year impact factor of the journals classified in Ulrich’s Serials Directory under the “Library and Information Sciences” subject heading. From the journals selected, only full‐length articles were collected. Editorials, book reviews, letters, interviews, commentaries, and news items were excluded from the analysis. This selection process yielded 1643 articles. A stratified random sample of 440 articles was chosen for in‐depth analysis ( Table 2 ). For the purpose of this study, five strata, corresponding to the five journals, were used. The sample size was determined using a margin of error, 4%, and confidence interval, 95%.

Table 1.

Profile of the journals.

Table 2.

Journal titles.

Each article was classified as either research or theoretical. Articles that employed specific research methodology and presented specific findings of original studies performed by the author(s) were considered research articles. The kind of study may vary (e.g., it could be an experiment, a survey, etc.), but in all cases, raw data had been collected and analyzed, and conclusions were drawn from the results of that analysis. Articles reporting research in system design or evaluation in the information systems field were also regarded as research articles . On the other hand, works that reviewed theories, theoretical concepts, or principles discussed topics of interest to researchers and professionals, or described research methodologies were regarded as theoretical articles [ 44 ] and were classified in the no‐empirical‐research category. In this category, were also included literature reviews and articles describing a project, a situation, a process, etc.

Each article was classified into a topical category according to its main subject. The articles classified as research were then further explored and analyzed to identify (i) research approach, (ii) research methodology, and (iii) method of data analysis. For each variable, a coding scheme was developed, and the articles were coded accordingly. The final list of the analysis codes was extracted inductively from the data itself, using as reference the taxonomies utilized in previous studies [ 15 , 32 , 43 , 45 ]. Research approaches “ are plans and procedures for research ” (p. 3) [ 46 ]. Research approaches can generally be grouped as qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods studies. Quantitative studies aim at the systematic empirical investigation of quantitative properties or phenomena and their relationships. Qualitative research can be broadly defined as “ any kind of research that produces findings not arrived at by means of statistical procedures or other means of quantification ” (p. 17) [ 47 ]. It is a way to gain insights through discovering meanings and explaining phenomena based on the attributes of the data. In mixed model research, quantitative and qualitative approaches are combined within or across the stages of the research process. It was beyond the scope of this study to identify in which stages of a study—data collection, data analysis, and data interpretation—the mixing was applied or to reveal the types of mixing. Therefore, studies using both quantitative and qualitative methods, irrespective of whether they describe if and how the methods were integrated, were coded as mixed methods studies.

Research methodologies , or strategies of inquiry, are types of research models “ that provide specific direction for procedures in a research design ” (p. 11) [ 46 ] and inform the decisions concerning data collection and analysis. A coding schema of research methodologies was developed by the authors based on the analysis of all research articles included in the sample. The methodology classification included 12 categories ( Table 3 ). Each article was classified into one category for the variable research methodology . If more than one research strategy was mentioned (e.g., experiment and survey), the article was classified according to the main strategy.

Table 3.

Coding schema for research methodologies.

Methods of data analysis refer to the techniques used by the researchers to explore the original data and answer their research problems or questions. Data analysis for quantitative researches involves statistical analysis and interpretation of figures and numbers. In qualitative studies, on the other hand, data analysis involves identifying common patterns within the data and making interpretations of the meanings of the data. The array of data analysis methods included the following categories:

Descriptive statistics,

Inferential statistics,

Qualitative data analysis,

Experimental evaluation, and

Other methods,

Descriptive statistics are used to describe the basic features of the data in a study. Inferential statistics investigate questions, models, and hypotheses. Mathematical analysis refers to mathematic functions, etc. used mainly in bibliometric studies to answer research questions associated with citation data. Qualitative data analysis is the range of processes and procedures used for the exploration of qualitative data, from coding and descriptive analysis to identification of patterns and themes and the testing of emergent findings and hypotheses. It was used in this study as an overarching term encompassing various types of analysis, such as thematic analysis, discourse analysis, or grounded theory analysis. The class experimental evaluation was used for system and software analysis and design studies which assesses the newly developed algorithm, tool, method, etc. by performing experiments on selected datasets. In these cases, “experiments” differ from the experimental designs in social sciences. Methods that did not fall into one of these categories (e.g., mathematical analysis, visualization, or benchmarking) were classified as other methods . If both descriptive and inferential statistics were used in an article, only the inferential were recorded. In mixed methods studies, each method was recorded in the order in which it was reported in the article.

Ten percent of the articles were randomly selected and used to establish inter‐rater reliability and provide basic validation of the coding schema. Cohen’s kappa was calculated for each coded variable. The average Cohen’s kappa value was κ = 0.60, p < 0.000 (the highest was 0.63 and lowest was 0.59). This indicates a substantial agreement [ 48 ]. The coding disparities across raters were discussed, and the final codes were determined via consensus.

3.3. Results

3.3.1. topic.

Table 4 presents the distribution of articles over the various topics, for each of which a detailed description is provided. The five most popular topics of the papers in the total sample of 440 articles were “information retrieval,” “information behavior,” “information literacy,” “library services,” and “organization and management.” These areas cover over 60% of all topics studied in the papers. The least‐studied topics (covered in less than eight papers) fall into the categories of “information and knowledge management,” “library information systems,” “LIS theory,” and “infometrics.”

Table 4.

Article topics.

Figure 1 shows how the top five topics are distributed across journals. As expected, the topic “information retrieval” has higher publication frequencies in Information Processing & Management, a journal focusing on system design and issues related to the tools and techniques used in storage and retrieval of information. “Information literacy,” “information behavior,” “library services,” and “organization and management” appear to be distributed almost proportionately in College & Research Libraries. “Information literacy” seems to be a more preferred topic in the Journal of Academic Librarianship, while “information behavior” is more popular in the Journal of Documentation and Library & Information Science Research.

Figure 1.

Distribution of topics across journals.

3.3.2. Research approach and methodology

Of all articles examined, 343 articles, which represent the 78% of the sample, reported empirical research. The rest 22% (N = 97) were classified as non‐empirical research papers. Research articles were coded as quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods studies. An overwhelming majority (70%) of the empirical research articles employed a quantitative research approach. Qualitative and mixed methods research was reported in 21.6 and 8.5% of the articles, respectively ( Figure 2 ).

Figure 2.

Research approach.

Table 5 presents the distribution of research approaches over the five most famous topics. The quantitative approach clearly prevails in all topics, especially in information retrieval research. However, qualitative designs seem to gain acceptance in all topics (except information retrieval), while in information behavior research, quantitative and qualitative approaches are almost evenly distributed. Mixed methods were quite frequent in information literacy and information behavior studies and less popular in the other topics.

Table 5.

Topics across research approach.

The most frequently used research strategy was survey, accounting for almost 37% of all research articles, followed by system and software analysis and design, a strategy used in this study specifically for research in information systems (Jarvelin & Vakkari, 1990). This result is influenced by the fact that Information Processing & Management addresses issues at the intersection between LIS and computer science, and the majority of its articles present the development of new tools, algorithms, methods and systems, and their experimental evaluation. The third‐ and fourth‐ranking strategies were content analysis and bibliometrics. Case study, experiment, and secondary data analysis were represented by 15 articles each, while the rest of the techniques were underrepresented with considerably fewer articles ( Table 6 ).

Table 6.

Research methodologies.

3.3.3. Methods of data analysis

Table 7 displays the frequencies for each type of data analysis.

Table 7.

Method of data analysis.

Almost half of the empirical research papers examined reported any use of statistics. Descriptive statistics, such as frequencies, means, or standard deviations, were more frequently used compared to inferential statistics, such as ANOVA, regression, or factor analysis. Nearly one‐third of the articles employed some type of qualitative data analysis either as the only method or—in mixed methods studies—in combination with quantitative techniques.

3.4. Discussions and conclusions

The patterns of LIS research activity as reflected in the articles published between 2011 and 2016 in five well‐established, peer‐reviewed journals were described and analyzed. LIS literature addresses many and diverse topics. Information retrieval, information behavior, and library services continue to attract the interest of researchers as they are core areas in library science. Information retrieval has been rated as one of the most famous areas of interest in research articles published between 1965 and 1985 [ 40 ]. According to Dimitroff [ 49 ], information retrieval was the second most popular topic in the articles published in the Bulletin of the Medical Library Association, while Cano [ 50 ] argued that LIS research produced in Spain from 1977 to 1994 was mostly centered on information retrieval and library and information services. In addition, Koufogiannakis et al. [ 42 ] found that information access and retrieval were the domain with the most research, and in Hildreth and Aytac’s [ 43 ] study, most articles were dealing with issues related to users (needs, behavior, information seeking, etc.), services, and collections. The present study provides evidence that the amount of research in information literacy is increasing, presumably due to the growing importance of information literacy instruction in libraries. In recent years, there is an ongoing educational role for librarians, who are more and more actively engaging in the teaching and learning processes, a trend that is reflected in the research output.

With regard to research methodologies, the present study seems to confirm the well‐documented predominance of survey in LIS research. According to Dimitroff [ 49 ], the percentage related to use of survey research methods reported in various studies varied between 20.3 and 41.5%. Powell [ 51 ], in a review of the research methods appearing in LIS literature, pointed out that survey had consistently been the most common type of study in both dissertations and journal articles. Survey reported the most widely used research design by Jarvelin and Vakkari [ 40 ], Crawford [ 52 ], Hildreth and Aytac [ 43 ], and Hider and Pymm [ 32 ]. The majority of articles examined by Koufogiannakis et al. [ 42 ] were descriptive studies using questionnaires/surveys. In addition, survey methods represented the largest proportion of methods used in information behavior articles analyzed by Julien et al. [ 53 ]. There is no doubt that survey has been used more than any other method in LIS research. As Jarvelin and Vakkari [ 15 ] put it, “it appears that the field is so survey‐oriented that almost all problems are seen through a survey viewpoint” (p. 416). Much of survey’s popularity can be ascribed to its being a well‐known, understood, easily conducted, and inexpensive method, which is easy to analyze results [ 41 , 42 ]. However, our findings suggest that while the survey ranks high, a variety of other methods have been also used in the research articles. Content analysis emerged as the third‐most frequent strategy, a finding similar to those of previous studies [ 17 , 32 ]. Although content analysis was not regarded by LIS researchers as a favored research method until recently, its popularity seems to be growing [ 17 ].

Quantitative approaches, which dominate, tend to rely on frequency counts, percentages, and descriptive statistics used to describe the basic features of the data in a study. Fewer studies used advanced statistical analysis techniques, such as t‐tests, correlation, and regressions, while there were some examples of more sophisticated methods, such as factor analysis, ANOVA, MANOVA, and structural equation modeling. Researchers engaging in quantitative research designs should take into consideration the use of inferential statistics, which enables the generalization from the sample being studied to the population of interest and, if used appropriately, are very useful for hypothesis testing. In addition, multivariate statistics are suitable for examining the relationships among variables, revealing patterns and understanding complex phenomena.

The findings also suggest that qualitative approaches are gaining increasing importance and have a role to play in LIS studies. These results are comparable to the findings of Hider and Pymm [ 32 ], who observed significant increases for qualitative research strategies in contemporary LIS literature. Qualitative analysis description varied widely, reflecting the diverse perspectives, analysis methods, and levels of depth of analysis. Commonly used terms in the articles included coding, content analysis, thematic analysis, thematic analytical approach, theme, or pattern identification. One could argue that the efforts made to encourage and promote qualitative methods in LIS research [ 54 , 55 ] have made some impact. However, qualitative research methods do not seem to be adequately utilized by library researchers and practitioners, despite their potential to offer far more illuminating ways to study library‐related issues [ 56 ]. LIS research has much to gain from the interpretive paradigm underpinning qualitative methods. This paradigm assumes that social reality is

the product of processes by which social actors together negotiate the meanings for actions and situations; it is a complex of socially constructed meanings. Human experience involves a process of interpretation rather than sensory, material apprehension of the external physical world and human behavior depends on how individuals interpret the conditions in which they find themselves. Social reality is not some ‘thing’ that may be interpreted in different ways, it is those interpretations (p. 96) [ 57 ].

As stated in the introduction of this chapter, library and information science focuses on the interaction between individuals and information. In every area of LIS research, the connection of factors that lead to and influence this interaction is increasingly complex. Qualitative research searches for “ all aspects of that complexity on the grounds that they are essential to understanding the behavior of which they are a part ” (p. 241) [ 59 ]. Qualitative research designs can offer a more in‐depth analysis of library users, their needs, attitudes, and behaviors.

The use of mixed methods designs was found to be rather rare. While Hildreth and Aytac [ 43 ] found higher percentages of studies using combined methods in data analysis, our results are analogous to those shown by Fidel [ 60 ]. In fact, as in her study, only few of the articles analyzed referred to mixed methods research by name, a finding indicating that “ the concept has not yet gained recognition in LIS research ” (p. 268). Mixed methods research has become an established research approach in the social sciences as it minimizes the weaknesses of quantitative and qualitative research alone and allows researchers to investigate the phenomena more completely [ 58 ].

In conclusion, there is evidence that LIS researchers employ a large number and wide variety of research methodologies. Each research approach, strategy, and method has its advantages and limitations. If the aim of the study is to confirm hypotheses about phenomena or measure and analyze the causal relationships between variables, then quantitative methods might be used. If the research seeks to explore, understand, and explain phenomena then qualitative methods might be used. Researchers can consider the full range of possibilities and make their selection based on the philosophical assumptions they bring to the study, the research problem being addressed, their personal experiences, and the intended audience for the study [ 46 ].

Taking into consideration the increasing use of qualitative methods in LIS studies, an in‐depth analysis of papers using qualitative methods would be interesting. A future study in which the different research strategies and types of analysis used in qualitative methods will be presented and analyzed could help LIS practitioners understand the benefits of qualitative analysis.

Mixed methods used in LIS research papers could be analyzed in future studies in order to identify in which stages of a study, data collection, data analysis, and data interpretation, the mixing was applied and to reveal the types of mixing.

As far as it concerns the quantitative research methods, which predominate in LIS research, it would be interesting to identify systematic relations between more than two variables such as authors’ affiliation, topic, research strategies, etc. and to create homogeneous groups using multivariate data analysis techniques.

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Library Hi Tech

ISSN : 0737-8831

Article publication date: 15 December 2020

Issue publication date: 25 August 2023

Library science and information science, two subdisciplines of library and information science (LIS), are developed independently but interconnectedly. In this information age, LIS is in a special period of transformation and development, which has caused some changes in both library science and information science. By accurately capturing these changes and analyzing them, the authors can effectively map the development of LIS in the new century, thus providing a reference for the evolution and development of the field. The purposes of this paper are to explore the mainstream research fields and frontiers of library science and information science, respectively, since the new century, and to make a comparative analysis of the two subdisciplines.

Design/methodology/approach

By using CiteSpace to visualize LIS journals, this study draws knowledge maps of the two subdisciplines of LIS through the co-occurrence descriptors network. Using burst detection algorithm, this study detects words of high frequency variation by investigating the time frequency distribution.

The results show that the research focus of library science has experienced a change from traditional to digital library while information science has moved from information to data focus. This study also finds the similarities and differences between mainstream areas of library science and information science.

Originality/value

This study focuses on the evolution of library science and information science, and explores their mainstream research fields and frontiers in the 21st century. These findings will promote the transformation and development of LIS as well as provide research directions for scholars in the field.

• Library science
• Information science
• Research frontier
• Development trend

Acknowledgements

This study was funded in part by major project of National Social Science Foundation of China (19ZDA348), the Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang Province (LY20G030011) and supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Provincial Universities of Zhejiang (GK209907299001-201) and National Social Science Foundation of China (61702009).

Song, Y. , Wei, K. , Yang, S. , Shu, F. and Qiu, J. (2023), "Analysis on the research progress of library and information science since the new century", Library Hi Tech , Vol. 41 No. 4, pp. 1145-1157. https://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-06-2020-0126

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Library and Information Science Research

Subject Area and Category

• Information Systems
• Library and Information Sciences

Elsevier B.V.

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The set of journals have been ranked according to their SJR and divided into four equal groups, four quartiles. Q1 (green) comprises the quarter of the journals with the highest values, Q2 (yellow) the second highest values, Q3 (orange) the third highest values and Q4 (red) the lowest values.

The SJR is a size-independent prestige indicator that ranks journals by their 'average prestige per article'. It is based on the idea that 'all citations are not created equal'. SJR is a measure of scientific influence of journals that accounts for both the number of citations received by a journal and the importance or prestige of the journals where such citations come from It measures the scientific influence of the average article in a journal, it expresses how central to the global scientific discussion an average article of the journal is.

Evolution of the number of published documents. All types of documents are considered, including citable and non citable documents.

This indicator counts the number of citations received by documents from a journal and divides them by the total number of documents published in that journal. The chart shows the evolution of the average number of times documents published in a journal in the past two, three and four years have been cited in the current year. The two years line is equivalent to journal impact factor ™ (Thomson Reuters) metric.

Evolution of the total number of citations and journal's self-citations received by a journal's published documents during the three previous years. Journal Self-citation is defined as the number of citation from a journal citing article to articles published by the same journal.

Evolution of the number of total citation per document and external citation per document (i.e. journal self-citations removed) received by a journal's published documents during the three previous years. External citations are calculated by subtracting the number of self-citations from the total number of citations received by the journal’s documents.

International Collaboration accounts for the articles that have been produced by researchers from several countries. The chart shows the ratio of a journal's documents signed by researchers from more than one country; that is including more than one country address.

Not every article in a journal is considered primary research and therefore "citable", this chart shows the ratio of a journal's articles including substantial research (research articles, conference papers and reviews) in three year windows vs. those documents other than research articles, reviews and conference papers.

Ratio of a journal's items, grouped in three years windows, that have been cited at least once vs. those not cited during the following year.

Evolution of the percentage of female authors.

Evolution of the number of documents cited by public policy documents according to Overton database.

Evoution of the number of documents related to Sustainable Development Goals defined by United Nations. Available from 2018 onwards.

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LIBRES: Library and Information Science Research E-Journal

Publication analysis, about the publication.

Title:   LIBRES: Library and Information Science Research e-journal

ISSN : 1058-6768

Website:   https://www.libres-ejournal.info/

Purpose, objective, or mission:   LIBRES , an international refereed e-journal, publishes research and scholarly articles in library and information science and services (LIS). “It has a particular focus on research in emerging areas of LIS, synthesis of LIS research areas, and on novel perspectives and conceptions that advance theory and practice.” 1

Target audience:   LIBRES  is for information science professionals and librarians interested in all aspects of LIS research and scholarship, but especially in emerging areas, novel perspectives, and new understandings of LIS theory and practice. 2

Publisher:   LIBRES  is jointly published by the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information and the NTU Libraries at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. It was previously published by the Department of Information Studies at Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia. 3

Peer reviewed?  At least two referees blind review each paper. 4

Type:   LIS scholarly journal.

Medium:   LIBRES  is an online, open-access journal.

Content:  This journal has three main sections, Research Papers, Synthesis & Perspectives, and Special Sections. The journal publishes research papers on studies that advance LIS, synthesis papers that survey areas of LIS for new or better understandings, and scholarly opinion or perspective papers that explore new conceptions of LIS. 5  Each Special Section is devoted to papers from conferences from around the globe, promoting the journal’s commitment to regional LIS scholarship. 6

Frequency of publication:  Twice a year, in June and December. 7

About the publication’s submission guidelines

Location of submission guidelines:   Author Guidelines .

Types of contributions accepted:   LIBRES  accepts scholarly research, synthesis, and perspective papers on any aspect of LIS, especially in emerging areas or with novel conceptions that advance theory and practice.  8

Submission and review process:  Submissions should be sent in Microsoft Word documents to the editor at [email protected]. Submissions are usually reviewed within 60 days of receipt. Papers should not be under review or published elsewhere. “The reviews will pay particular attention to whether the papers are interesting, useful, thoughtful, and a significant contribution to knowledge in the LIS field.” 9

Editorial tone:  The journal uses a formal academic style. The journal’s official language is English, but the editor encourages submissions from developing countries and countries where English is not the native language; revision and editing for readability are part of the publication process. 10

Style guide used:   Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association , 6th edition. 11

Conclusion: Evaluation of publication’s potential for LIS authors

LIBRES  is focused on new research and novel perspectives from the LIS international academic community. Authors can submit to either the Research Papers section or to the Synthesis & Perspectives section. The journal’s authorship is international, and it publishes articles from developed and developing countries;  LIBRES  takes “a nurturing attitude towards papers and authors,” and the editorial board provides “substantive guidance to the authors,” especially those who are not native English speakers. 12  “In subject coverage, it has a particular strength in library/information service,” and it promotes worldwide regional LIS community scholarship by publishing conference papers. 13  It publishes high-quality research, often on technology and service, from a many different countries, pushing LIS regional and international innovation forward.

Audience analysis

About the publication’s readers.

Publication circulation:  Data not available.

Audience location and language or cultural considerations:    LIBRES  is published in English and is international in scope, 14  and the editorial board is especially interested in linking up with “regional LIS research communities worldwide.” 15

Reader characteristics:  The audience of  LIBRES  is LIS academics and professionals from around the world, 16  and papers are published by authors from the United States, Mexico, Cuba, Qatar, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Malaysia, to name a few. The conference papers in the Special Sections expand its international scope in terms of research and readership.

Knowledge of LIS subject matter:  Readers will have a professional and scholarly understanding of LIS practice and research.

Conclusion: Analysis of reader characteristics and their potential impact on authors

This scholarly journal’s readers will expect formal research and high-level syntheses. Topics for submission include current and emerging LIS research areas, emerging technology, and library service. For LIS professional and student researchers,  LIBRES  is a good place to research that investigates practices within library and information science environments and advances in new and emerging technology. For LIS scholars,  LIBRES  encourages synthesis papers that consider theory and practice in a new light and opinion and perspective pieces that explore new ideas in LIS.

Last updated:  January 30, 2018

• “About LIBRES,”  LIBRES,  accessed January 26, 2018,  https://www.libres-ejournal.info/about-libres/ .
• “About LIBRES.”
• “Author Guidelines,”  LIBRES,  accessed January 26, 2018,  https://www.libres-ejournal.info/author-guidelines/ .
• For example, Special Section: Digital Curation Projects and Research in Asia,  LIBRIS  26, no. 1 (2018), accessed January 26, 2018,  https://www.libres-ejournal.info/all-issues/volume-26-issue-1/ .
• “Author Guidelines.”
• Chris Khoo, “Editorial,”  LIBRIS  25, no. 1 (2015), accessed January 31, 2018,  https://www.libres-ejournal.info/1621/ .
• Chris Khoo, “Editorial,”  LIBRIS  24, no. 1 (2014), accessed January 31, 2018,  https://www.libres-ejournal.info/1369/ .
• Khoo, “Editorial” (2014).
• Khoo, “Editorial”  ( 2014).

Peer Reviewed LIS Journals

This list of peer-reviewed library and information science (LIS) journals is intended to help librarian and archivist researchers identify journals where they can submit manuscripts.

Most titles on this list are in English; some Canadian titles are bilingual and also accept submissions in French.

Only active titles are included; titles that have ceased publication are removed. Titles that have changed names are listed under the current name with previous names also provided.

The information about each title includes:

• Journal title (linked to the journal’s website)
• Country of Publication
• Society (if applicable)
• ISSN (print, online)
• First year of publication 

The list is now also available as a viewable Google Sheet or a downloadable csv file , for easier filtering, sorting, searching, or other analysis. The Google Sheet currently includes tabs for the complete data, a count of journals in each category, and a count of open access and subscription access journals. Thanks to Tim Ribaric at Brock University for the suggestion and initial creation of this machine readable list.

This list was first created by Selinda Berg for use by the librarians and archivists at Western University and has been shared with CARL Librarians' Research Institute participants since its first iteration. Kristin Hoffmann from Western updated this list and it is current to January 2024 . Kristin and Selinda feel that this list is most useful when shared widely, so C-EBLIP is happy to host this list here.

• Submit an addition or correction

Academic Libraries

The journal publishes articles on topics related to academic librarians and the profession of academic librarianship. It is open to all disciplines and methodologies. Submissions must present substantive analysis of a topic. Articles need not have a geographical focus; however, if they do, the focus should be on Canada or have a strong connection to Canada. Submissions are accepted and published in English and French.

College & Research Libraries . United States. Association of College and Research Libraries. ISSN: 0010-0870. 1939

The journal includes articles in all fields of interest and concern to academic and research libraries. The focus is on reports of original research; submissions may also include descriptive narratives of successful and unsuccessful ventures, thoughtful discussions of issues in librarianship, and other suitable subjects.

College & Undergraduate Libraries . United States. Haworth Information Press. ISSN: 1069-1316. 1994

The journal highlights undergraduate learning through libraries along with collaborations and connections both on and off campus. It publishes research-based articles, case studies, reports of best practices, occasional literature or product reviews, and columns or special issues devoted to current topics.

Community & Junior College Libraries: the journal for learning resources centers . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0276-3915, 1545-2522. 1982

The journal specifically targets issues concerning community college libraries and learning resource centers.   It publishes theoretical research and practical studies dealing with delivery of information resources to lower division undergraduate students. Book reviews, editorials, letters to the editor, and ongoing columns with specific focus are also included.

Journal of Academic Librarianship . United Kingdom. Elsevier. ISSN: 0099-1333. 1975

The journal publishes articles that focus on problems and issues germane to college and university libraries. Authors may present research findings and, where applicable, their practical applications and significance; analyze policies, practices, issues, and trends; speculate about the future of academic librarianship; present analytical bibliographic essays and philosophical treatises. The journal also includes book reviews, information on technology issues, digests of special reports, and a guide to sources and analysis of library metrics.

New Review of Academic Librarianship, The . United Kingdom. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1361-4533. 1740-7834. 1986

The journal publishes reviews, research, critiques, and case studies on a range of topics that are of interest to those providing library and information services to academic communities. The journal emphasizes the relevance and applicability of theory or research for the academic library practitioner. A wide range of topics are of interest.

portal: Libraries and the Academy . United States. The Johns Hopkins University Press. ISSN: 1531-2542, 1530-7131. 2001

The journal focuses on research about the role of academic libraries and librarianship. It also features commentary on issues in technology and publishing. Articles may focus on any aspect of librarianship, knowledge management, and information services and studies within higher education.

Practical Academic Librarianship: The International Journal of the SLA Academic Division . United States. SLA: Special Libraries Association ISSN: 1947-0037. 2011

The journal audience includes all academic librarians and information professionals serving academic departments or affiliated institutions including centers, institutes, specialized collections, and special units within or related to academic units. The journal publishes original research, papers about new initiatives and best practices, analysis of issues and trends, descriptive narratives, and papers that examine libraries’ role in meeting specialized client needs. A wide range of topics are of interest.

Public Services Quarterly . United States. Taylor & Francis . ISSN: 1522-8959, 1522-9114 . 2002 Previous title: Public & Access Services Quarterly (1995-2001).

The journal covers a range of public service issues in academic libraries. It publishes research-based and theoretical articles as well as case studies, practice-based articles, and columns on resources and key themes in the field. It aims to present practical strategies for implementing new initiatives and research-based insights into effective practices.

Archives and History of the Library

American Archivist . United States. Society of American Archivists. ISSN: 0360-9081. 1938

The journal provides a forum for discussion of trends and issues in archival theory and practice both in the United States and abroad. It publishes research articles, case studies, perspectives, and international scene pieces, as well as reviews of professional literature, archival technologies, and resources. 

Archival Issues . United States. Midwest Archives Conference. ISSN: 1067-4993. 1976

The journal publishes articles and book reviews on archival theory and practice. Article topics can cover the full range of archival activity. The journal particularly encourages submissions from archivists who have not published previously.

Archival Practice . United States. 2014

The journal publishes research articles, case studies, position pieces, and “From the Field” submissions related to all aspects of modern archival practice. It provides a scholarly forum for discussion of real-world application of archival theories and practices.

Archival Science: International journal on recorded information . Netherlands. Springer Netherlands. ISSN: 1389-0166. 2000

The journal aims to promote archival science as an autonomous scientific discipline. Its primary audience is researchers and educators in archival science. Its approach is integrated, interdisciplinary, and intercultural.

The journal publishes articles that contribute to the scholarly investigation of archives in Canada and internationally. It welcomes submissions that explore the history, nature, and theory of archives and the use of archives, from both practitioners and academics. While it is primarily an English-language journal, it will publish articles in French, and articles have both English and French abstracts.

Archives and Manuscripts . Australia. Taylor & Francis. Australian Society of Archivists Inc.. ISSN: 0157-6895 , 2164-6058. 1955

The journal publishes original articles, reflection articles, and book reviews about the theory and practice of archives and recordkeeping in Australasia and around the world. 

The journal explores all aspects of archival practice. Submissions that explore archival issues from practical, working-level perspectives or theoretical explorations with demonstrated praxis are particularly encouraged. The journal welcomes submissions from students, new professionals and working archivists who may not have published before.

Journal of Archival Organization . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1533-2748, 1533-2756. 2002 Incorporates Library & Archival Security

The journal covers all aspects of the arrangement, description, and provision of access to all forms of archival materials. Articles addressing academic, public and special/corporate libraries, museums and governmental agencies are all welcome.

Libraries: Culture, History, and Society United States. Penn State University Press for the Library History Round Table of the American Library Association. ISSN: 2473-0343, 2473-036X. 2017

The journal publishes work on libraries within their broader historical, humanistic, and social contexts. It promotes library history as its own field of scholarship, while promoting cross-disciplinary research on libraries’ relationships with their unique environments. The journal encourages papers that present interdisciplinary perspectives, and welcomes authors from outside library science.

Library and Information History . United Kingdom. Taylor & Francis. Chartered Institute of Library & Information Professionals. ISSN: 1758-3489, 1759-3497. 2009 Previous title: Library History (1967-2008)

This British journal publishes articles on all subjects and periods relating to the history of libraries and librarianship and to the history of information, in its broadest sense. The journal publishes articles as well as book reviews, occasional surveys of recent publications, and guides to relevant sources. 

The Library: the transactions of the Bibliographical Society . United Kingdom. Oxford University Press. ISSN: 0024-2160. 18??

The journal is for the study of bibliography and of the role of the book in history. Its scope includes all aspects of descriptive, analytical, textual and historical bibliography. As well as articles and notes, each issue includes book reviews and lists of recent books and periodicals in the field.

Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada . Canada. The Bibliographical Society of Canada. ISSN: 0067-6896, 2562-8941. 1962

The journal publishes original articles and notes in the field of bibliography and/or the history of the book, a field broadly construed to include printing and publishing history, studies of authorship, print culture studies, digital humanities, copyright history, the history of reading, textual studies, scholarly editing, library history, historical bibliography, descriptive/analytic bibliography, communications studies, media history, and any literary or historical research that takes particular account of the material forms of texts. The journal does not publish enumerative bibliographies (lists of publications on specialized topics).

RBM: A Journal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Cultural Heritage . United States. Association of College and Research Libraries. ISSN: 1529-6407, 1529-668X. 1986

The journal covers topics related to special collections libraries and cultural heritage institutions. Themes of interest to the journal include how we cope with emerging technologies, new economic models for collecting, the creation of strategic partnerships, and the ways in which people experience the "authentic."

Collections

Collection and Curation . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. ISSN: 2514-9326. 2018 Previous title: Collection Building (1978-2017)

Collection and Curation provides well-researched and authoritative information on the rapidly-changing conceptions of what collection development is in libraries, archives, museums and galleries. Topics include but are not limited to collection management of files and data, curriculum mapping, collection assessment, technological innovations, cultural heritage artefacts, public libraries and civic engagement, and use of space in collections.

Collection Management . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0146-2679, 1545-2549 . 1975

The journal publishes articles about building, administering, preserving, assessing, and organizing library collections. It also publishes reviews of relevant books, technological resources, and software.

Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1941-126X, 1941-1278. 2008 Previous title: The Acquisitions Librarian (1989-2008)

The journal publishes current research, work-related processes and procedures, and news on topics related to electronic resources and issues surrounding the changes in collections, acquisitions and services in libraries in the digital age.

Serials Librarian, The . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0361-526X, 1541-1095 . 1976

The journal focuses on scholarly communication and all aspects of serials, e-books, monographic series, databases, etc. Articles may be theoretical or practical in nature. Submissions may also address related concerns such as peer review, cataloging, or resource discovery.

Serials Review . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0098-7913, 1879-095X. 1975

The journal publishes articles on all aspects of serials management, such as format considerations, publishing models, statistical studies, collection analysis, collaborative efforst, reference and access issues, cataloging and acquisitions, people who have shaped the serials community, and topical bibliographic studies. 

Information Access and Management

Ariadne: Web Magazine for Information Professionals . United Kingdom. Loughborough University Library. ISSN: 1361-3200. 1996

Primarily practice-oriented articles on a variety of topics.  Target audience is librarians, museum curators, archivists and associated technical staff & managers.  Guidelines recommend submitting an article proposal/outline in advance of the article.

Aslib Journal of Information Management . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing. ISSN: 2050-3806, 2014 Previous title: Aslib Proceedings: new information perspectives (1949-2013)

Focuses on current international developments in the research and practice of information management and information science.  Areas of interest include social media, data protection, search engines, information retrieval, digital libraries, information behaviour, intellectual property and copyright, information industry, digital repositories and information policy and governance. The journal covers economic, behavioural, social, ethical, technological, international, business-related, political and management-oriented factors. 

Cataloging & Classification Quarterly . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0163-9374, 1544-4554 . 1980

The journal publishes articles in the field of bibliographic organization. It considers the full spectrum of creation, content, management, use, and usability of bibliographic records. Articles may deal with historical settings as well as contemporary, and with theory and scholarly research as well as practical applications.

The Electronic Library: Digital Information Organisation and Use . Emerald Group Publishing. ISSN: 0264-0473. 1983

The Indexer: The international journal of indexing . United Kingdom. Society of Indexers. ISSN: 0019-4131, 1756-0632 . 1958

Covers full range of subjects about indexing, including new techniques, practical applications of tools, and the history of indexing.  Reviews cover print and electronic material including websites, hardware, and software.  Also has an "Indexes Reviewed" section that highlights best and worst examples of indexing.  

Information Discovery and Delivery . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing. ISSN: 2398-6247. 2017 Previous titles: Interlending Review (1979-1983), Interlending & Document Supply (1984-2016).

The journal publishes research and practice which explores the digital information supply chain; that is, transport, flows, tracking, exchange and sharing, including within and between libraries. It is also interested in digital information capture, packaging and storage by ‘collectors’ of all kinds.

Information Resources Management Journal . United States. IGI Global. ISSN: 1040-1628, 1533-7979 . 1988

The journal publishes research articles containing applied research on topics that demonstrate the theory and practice of how information technology drives and improves organizational function. Articles may discuss managerial and organizational facets of information technology resources management, as well as issues concerning usage, failure, success, policies, strategies, and applications of information technology in organizations.

Information Services & Use . Netherlands. I O S Press. ISSN: 0167-5265, 1875-8789 . 1981

The journal is an information and information technology oriented publication with a wide scope of subject matters such as: online systems, offline systems, electronic publishing, library automation, education and training, word processing and telecommunications.

Interdisciplinary Journal of Information, Knowledge, and Management . United States. Informing Science Institute. ISSN: 1555-1229, 1555-1237. 2006  

The journal publishes articles on the use of information technology to enhance organizational performance. Articles with a sound underpinning of information and knowledge principles/theories on information and knowledge management are also welcome. The journal publishes conceptual, theoretical and empirical papers.

International Journal of Information Management . United Kingdom. Elsevier. ISSN: 0268-4012. 1980

The journal publishes on a wide array of topics including: information management in learning organizations, business intelligence, knowledge management, information design and delivery, legal and regulatory issues, philosophical and methodological approaches, new and emerging research agendas, and reflective accounts of professional practice. It publishes research papers, case studies, and reviews. It encourages submissions from diverse areas of practice and settings.

Journal of Access Services . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1536-7967, 1536-7975 . 2002

The journal publishes research, theory, and practice papers relevant to the access services in libraries and archives of all types. It covers all the services that provide, facilitate, and manage the access of patrons to the information resources acquired or made available by libraries or archives. The journal looks for best practices and new insights of access services that may be based on research, studies, and experiences.

Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology . United States. John Wiley & Sons. Association for Information Science and Technology. ISSN: 1532-2882, 2330-1643. 1938-1942 (suspended); resumed 1950

JASIST publishes original research that focuses on the production, discovery, recording, storage, representation, retrieval, presentation, manipulation, dissemination, use, and evaluation of information and on the tools and techniques associated with these processes. The journal welcomes rigorous work of an empirical, experimental, ethnographic, conceptual, historical, socio-technical, policy-analytic, or critical-theoretical nature.

Journal of Classification . United States. Springer. ISSN: 0176-4268, 1432-1343 . 1984

The journal presents work in the field of classification, broadly defined. Areas of interest include supervised classification, unsupervised classification (clustering), semi-supervised classification, statistical computing, statistical learning, numerical taxonomy, multivariate statistics, and machine learning. The principal discipline represented is statistics, but information retrieval and many other disciplines are also represented.

Journal of Documentation . United Kingdom. Emerald Publishing. ISSN: 0022-0418. 1945

The journal publishes research papers in all information-related disciplines. They welcome submissions exploring topics where concepts and models in LIS overlap with those in cognate disciplines such as communication and media studies, psychology, sociology, or publishing. The journal aims to provide a link between research, scholarship, and reflective professional practice.

Journal of Interlibrary Loan, Document Supply & Electronic Reserve . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1072-303X, 1540-3572. 2005 Previous titles: Journal of Interlibrary Loan & Information Supply (1990 - 1993), Journal of Interlibrary Loan, Document Delivery & Information Supply (1993 - 2004). Incorporates Resource Sharing & Information Networks (2010-).  

The journal publishes on all topics related to library resource sharing, including but not limited to: interlibrary loan, shared storage facilities, shared virtual services, cooperative training, electronic reserves, and collection development. It provides a forum for pure and applied research results, discussions of best practices, and literature reviews.

Library Resources & Technical Services . United States. Association for Library Collections Technical Services, American Library Association. 1957-2020; Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures, 2020-   ISSN: 2159-9610 . 1957

LRTS publishes papers that present research or that discuss operational issues related to collections, scholarly communication, preservation and digitization, acquisitions, continuing resources, and cataloging.

Records Management Journal . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. ISSN: 0956-5698. 1989

The journal publishes research and practice on the people, process, and systems/technology aspects of managing records and information in organizations. It covers records/information creation and capture, organization and access, preservation and disposal, systems design, information governance, and risk. It welcomes contributions from interdisciplinary perspectives.

Technical Services Quarterly . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0731-7131, 1555-3337 . 1983

The journal publishes work about current developments and future trends in research, developments, and practical implementation of systems and applications of traditional and non-traditional technical services. It accepts articles that present original research, theory, or implementation.

Information Ethics

Ethics and Information Technology . Netherlands. Springer. ISSN: 1388-1957, 1572-8439 . 1999

The journal promotes analyses of  ethical, social and political questions associated with the adoption, use, and development of information and communication technology (ICT). Reflections on the history of ideas and ICT are also encouraged, as are analyses of ethical ICT issues within the context of technology assessment, cultural studies, public policy analysis and public administration, cognitive science, social and anthropological studies in technology, mass-communication, and legal studies. It includes original articles and book reviews.  

The International Journal of Information, Diversity, & Inclusion (IJIDI) United States. University of Maryland Library. ISSN: 2574-3430. 2016 

The journal presents multidisciplinary perspectives on the intersection of equity, social justice, and information, and encourages authors and readers to think about diversity and inclusion in broad terms. It invites submissions from the LIS community and other disciplines.

International Journal of Information Ethics . Germany. International Center for Information Ethics. ISSN: 1614-1687. (also known as International Review of Information Ethics) 2004

The journal focuses on the ethical impacts of information technology on human practices and thinking, social interaction, other areas of science and research and the society itself. An international or intercultural perspective is encouraged.

Library Diversity and Residency Studies . United States. University of North Carolina Greensboro. 2020

LDRS publishes articles that are engaged in the social justice project of increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in the library profession and in LIS curricula. The journal is committed to providing a platform for work that might otherwise be marginalized from dominant discourses. They are committed to working with authors during the submission and review process.

Information Literacy and Instruction

Communications in Information Literacy . United States. Communications in Information Literacy. ISSN: 1933-5954. 2007

CIL is devoted to advancing research, theory, and practice in the area of information literacy in higher education.   The editors of CIL are committed to the exploration and investigation of the various models of information literacy throughout the world, and they are faithful to unpolluted principles of open access for academic research.

Education for Information . Netherlands. I O S Press. ISSN: 0167-8329 , 1875-8649 . 1983

This journal publishes fundamental and applied research in the interdisciplinary field of the information studies. Topics of interest include but are not limited to education, pedagogy and learning in the iFields; information seeking and use; information policy and ethics; information retrieval; digital humanities; documentation theory and practice; data science; gender studies in the iFields, etc. The journal also welcomes historical and foundational research in the iFields, including works that bridge the iFields with other fields, such as science and technology studies or the philosophy of technology, Philosophy, Media Studies.

Information and Learning Sciences . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing. ISSN: 2398-5348. 2017 Previous titles: Library World (1989-1970), New Library World (1971-2016), incorporated Asian Libraries (1991-2000)

The journal advances interdisciplinary research that explores the scholarly intersection of information science and the learning / education sciences, especially as related to design and uses of information and e-learning systems innovations. Topics may include e-learning perspectives on information seeking, design and use of learning management systems or search systems, social and ethical issues in e-learning contexts, and much more.

Interdisciplinary Journal of e-Skills and Lifelong Learning . United States. Informing Science Institute. ISSN: 2375-2084, 2375-2092. 2005 Previous title: Interdisciplinary Journal of E-Learning and Learning Objects  

IJELL’s mission is the promotion of innovative scholarly research covering aspects of online, browsing, big data, analytics and other pertinent technologies for adult learners’ literacies and e-skills. It publishes scholarly articles on the development of e-skills and lifelong learning, covering conceptual, theoretical and empirical papers. Articles with a sound underpinning of pedagogical principles and design science on the development of e-skills using information technology are also welcome.

Journal of Information Literacy . United Kingdom. CILIP Information Literacy Group . ISSN: 1750-5968, 1533-2918 . 2007

JIL aims to investigate information literacy in all its forms to address the interests of diverse IL communities of practice.  To this end it publishes articles from both established and new authors in this field. JIL welcomes contributions that push the boundaries of IL beyond the educational setting and examine this phenomenon as a continuum between those involved in its development and delivery and those benefiting from its provision.

Journal of Library & Information Services in Distance Learning . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1533-290X. 2004

The journal accepts original research, theoretical papers, substantive articles, essays, book and literature reviews, and research reports that cover programs and innovations related to the field of distance education. It also addresses a wide variety of subjects that are vital to the field, including but not limited to: collection development strategies, faculty/librarian partnerships or collaborations, cutting edge instruction and reference techniques, document delivery, remote access, evaluation, etc.

Library and Information Science

The journal serves as a forum for discussion of theory and research in library and information science. It publishes in English and French. The journal welcomes submissions in all areas of library and information science research. It has published research on such topics as information behaviour, information retrieval, professional issues, information organization, scholarly communication, information policy, research methods, and educational issues.

Collaborative Librarianship .  United States. University of Denver . ISSN: 1943-7528. 2009

The journal is dedicated to highlighting all forms of collaboration - within libraries, between libraries, with non-library partners, and with consortia. It publishes From the Field Reports as well as scholarly peer-reviewed articles. Scholarly articles may approach the topic of collaboration in a variety of ways, including historically, quantitatively, qualitatively, analytically, theoretically, philosophically, or practically. The articles can take local, regional, national, or international perspectives.

Endnotes: The Journal of the New Members Round Table . United States. ALA. ISSN: 2159-0591. 2010

The journal welcomes submissions that address issues faced by new librarians. It accepts research and practitioner-based articles as well as web site reviews and scholarly book reviews. The journal aims to work with new authors to produce quality scholarly articles.

Evidence Based Library and Information Practice . Canada. University of Alberta Library. ISSN: 1715-720X. 2006

The purpose of the journal is to provide a forum for librarians and other information professionals to discover research that may contribute to decision making in professional practice. EBLIP publishes original research and commentary on the topic of evidence based library and information practice, as well as reviews of previously published research (evidence summaries) on a wide number of topics.

Global Knowledge, Memory and Communication . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd.. ISSN: 2514-9342. 2018   Previous Title: Library Review (1927-2017).

The journal is concerned with innovation and developments in digital information, as they relate to global knowledge, communication and world memory.  It covers the creation, management, dissemination and use of the full range of information objects.

IFLA Journal . United Kingdom. SAGE Publications. ISSN 0340-0352. 1969

The journal publishes articles on library and information services and the social, political and economic issues that impact access to information through libraries. It is published four times per year (January, June, October, December) and includes research, case studies and essays that reflect the broad spectrum of the profession internationally.

Information & Culture . United States. University of Texas Press, Journals Division. ISSN: 2164-8034, 2166-3033, 2013. Previous titles: Libraries & the Cultural Record (2007-2012), Libraries & Culture (1989-2006), The Journal of Library History (1975-1988), Journal of Library History, Philosophy, and Comparative Librarianship (1974), The Journal of Library History (1966-1973).

Information Research: An international electronic journal . Sweden. University of Borås . ISSN: 1368-1613. 1976

The journal publishes papers in the fields of information science, information management, information systems, information policy, archives and records management and librarianship. It is interested in papers that deal with these topics either in general, or with reference to a particular application area. For example, papers on health information management and information seeking in a health context, or on the relationship between media and information seeking or information management, or papers on the relationship between information behaviour and computer use. 

Informing Science: The international journal of an emerging transdiscipline . United States. Informing Science Institute. ISSN: 1547-9684 , 1521-4672 . 1997

The journal welcomes papers that investigate better ways to inform, from diverse fields such as technology, psychology, brain science, and information science. It welcomes conceptual, theoretical, and empirical contributions.

InterActions: UCLA Journal of Education and Information Studies . United States. California Digital Library for UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies. ISSN: 1548-3320. 2004

The journal is committed to the promotion of interdisciplinary and inclusive scholarship. It encourages submissions that use inclusive and critical frameworks in politically engaged ways. Submissions may draw upon traditional areas of inquiry within the fields of education and information studies (e.g., public policy, systems design) or from newer interdisciplinary perspectives (e.g., queer studies, critical race theory, poststructuralism).

International Information and Library Review . United States. Taylor & Francis . ISSN: 1057-2317, 1095-9297 . 1969

The journal publishes papers based on a global perspective for library and information professionals and paraprofessionals in public, academic, special, government, and corporate environments. It welcomes papers on a broad range of topics related to library and information services.

International Journal of Librarianship . Published by the Chinese American Librarians Association . ISSN:2474-3542. 2016

The International Journal of Librarianship (IJoL), a peer-reviewed open access journal of research and discussion dealing with all aspects of libraries and librarianship, welcomes articles relating to academic, research, public, school and special libraries and other information institutes. The IJoL works to highlight a wide range of international perspectives on key subjects in librarianship, particularly in our frequent special topic issues.

International Journal of Library and Information Services . IGI Global. ISSN: 2475-997X. 2017  Previous title: International Journal of Digital Library Systems (2010-2016) 

The journal publishes articles on a wide range of topics that cover the latest developments and technological advancements in library service innovation. The journal converted to open access in 2021 and charges a publication fee after the manuscript is accepted and before publication.

In the Library with the Lead Pipe . United States. ISSN: 1944-6195. 2008

The journal publishes articles by authors representing diverse perspectives. It aims to improve libraries, professional organizations, and their communities of practice by exploring new ideas, starting conversations, documenting our concerns, and arguing for solutions. The journal publishes original research; articles using autoethnography or other accounts of the author’s own experience to contribute new insights; articles arguing for a particular approach, strategy or development in librarianship; and transformative works with additional explanatory or interpretive context. The journal uses an open peer review process.

The Journal of Creative Library Practice . United States. ISSN: 2330-4227. 2013

The journal provides a place to document innovative approaches to our work as librarians. It publishes articles that are reflections on professional practice, reports on projects or experiments, research studies, critical approaches to library practice, or book reviews. It welcomes submissions from every type of library. Authors may opt for peer review.

Journal of Critical Library and Information Studies . United States. Litwin Press. ISSN: 2572-1364. 2017

The journal aims to showcase innovative research that queries and critiques current and prevailing paradigms in library and information studies, in theory and practice through critical approaches and perspectives that originate from across the humanities and social sciences. JCLIS is committed to supplying a platform for the publication of rigorous inter-/multi-/trans-disciplinary research that might be otherwise marginalized from dominant discourses.

Journal of Education for Library and Information Science . United States. Association for Library and Information Science Education. ISSN: 2328-2967 . 1960

The journal supports scholarly inquiry in library and information science (LIS) education by serving as the primary venue for the publication of research articles, reviews, and brief communications about issues of interest to LIS educators. 

Journal of Graduate Librarianship . United States. Charles C. Sherrod Library of East Tennessee State University. ISSN: 2995-9063. 2023

The journal is dedicated exclusively to matters pertaining to graduate librarianship. It is written, edited, adn governed by library practitioners who work with graduate students, faculty and programs. JGL publishes articles on all aspects and types of graduate librarianship, and seeks to advance the qualities contained in the acronym SHOP: Shared Honest Open Practice.

Journal of Information Science . United Kingdom. SAGE Publications Ltd. (for Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals) . ISSN: 0165-5515 , 1741-6485 . 1979

The journal covers topics of interest to all those researching and working in the sciences of information and knowledge management. It welcomes submissions on any aspect of information science theory, policy, application or practice. 

Journal of Librarianship and Information Science . United Kingdom. SAGE Publications Ltd.. ISSN: 0961-0006 , 1741-6477 . 1969

The journal publishes research and practical developments, as well as discussion papers and viewpoints on topical concerns. It welcomes papers from practising librarians, information workers, and academics on all aspects of librarianship and information science.

Journal of Library Outreach and Engagement . United States. Illinois Open Publishing Network. ISSN: 2690-2672. 2020

The journal publishes research on public and community engagement initiatives in libraries of all types. It is interested in the methodological and epistemological issues that inform or emerge from such projects and programs. It also publishes “Idea Lab” and “Notes from the Field” columns, and book reviews.

Journal of New Librarianship . United States. ISSN: 2471-3880. 2016

The journal provides a forum for both traditional and disruptive forms of scholarly and professional communication that forge innovative paths in the way the LIS profession shares and leads. It aims to publish emerging and interdisciplinary scholarship that does not fit within the narrow subject specialization of existing journals.

Journal of Radical Librarianship . ISSN: 2399-956X. 2014

The journal publishes high quality, rigorously reviewed, and innovative scholarly work in the field of radical librarianship. It welcomes any work that contributes to a discourse around critical library and information theory and practice. It also publishes non-peer reviewed reports, commentary, and reviews.

Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association . Australia. Taylor & Francis (for the Australian Library and Information Association). ISSN: 2475-0158, 2475-0166. 2017 Previous titles: The Australian Library Journal (1951-2016), Australian Academic & Research Libraries (1970-2016)

The journal publishes research articles and other scholarly papers about, or relevant to, the Australian and Southern Asia Pacific regions.

LIBER Quarterly . LIBER, the Association of European Research Libraries. ISSN: 2213-056X. 1991

The journal covers all aspects of modern research librarianship and information delivery. It is intended to be a bridge between research and practice, and so publishes both theoretical papers and descriptions of examples of good practices. Contributions from outside of Europe are welcome as long as the topic is relevant for librarians and researchers in European research institutes. As of 2017, the journal moved to a continuous publication model; although the journal name still includes ‘quarterly,’ only one issue is published per year.

Library and Information Research . United Kingdom. Library and Information Research Group.  CILIP. ISSN: 1756-1086  2003. Previous title: Library and Information Research News (1978-2002)

The journal publishes research articles and aims to encourage ‘research into practice.’ It is also interested in publishing practical case studies that illustrate best practice. Authors are asked to keep contributions as clear and practical as possible, and to explain how the research results should affect practice.

Library & Information Science Research . United Kingdom. Elsevier. ISSN: 0740-8188. 1979

The journal focuses on the research process in library and information science, especially demonstrations of innovative methods and theoretical frameworks or unusual extensions or applications of well-known methods and tools. It publishes research articles primarily from a social science perspective.

Library Philosophy and Practice . United States. University of Nebraska - Lincoln. ISSN: 1522-0222. 1999

The journal publishes articles exploring the connection between library practice and the philosophy and theory behind it. These include explorations of current, past, and emerging theories of librarianship and library practice, as well as reports of successful, innovative, or experimental library procedures, methods, or projects in all areas of librarianship, set in the context of applied research. It is an international journal that embraces the concept of World Englishes and International English; well-written articles in any variety of academic English are welcomed.

Library Quarterly . United States. University of Chicago Press. ISSN: 0024-2519 , 1549-652X . 1931

The journal embraces a wide array of original research perspectives, approaches, and quantitative, qualitative, evaluative, analytic, and mixed methodology to assess the role of libraries in communities and in society. All content in the journal ties to contemporary issues impacting libraries and librarianship.

Library Trends . United States. The Johns Hopkins University Press. ISSN: 0024-2594 , 1559-0682 . 1952

Each issue of Library Trends covers a specific thematic topic, with submissions organized by guest editor(s) selected by the co editors-in-chief. Proposals should include the nature and scope of the proposed topic, the contributions of the articles to be included, and the names of potential authors. The journal does not accept single-article submissions.

Libres: Library and Information Science Research Electronic Journal . Singapore. Nanyang Technological University . ISSN: 1058-6768. 1990

The journal publishes research and scholarly articles in Library and Information Science/Service (LIS). It has a particular focus on research in emerging areas of LIS, synthesis of LIS research areas, and on novel perspectives and conceptions that advance theory and practice. It publishes research papers, synthesis papers that survey an area of LIS, and opinion/perspectives papers.

LIBRI: International Journal of Libraries and Information Studies . Germany. De Gruyter Saur. ISSN: 0024-2667, 1950

The journal publishes papers about the functions of libraries and information services from both a historical and present-day perspective, including current trends in librarianship. This also includes analysis of the role of information in cultural, organizational, national and international developments.

Marketing Libraries Journal. United States. ISSN: 2475-8116. 2017

The journal publishes research in library marketing and its components (public relations, publicity, outreach, advocacy, and marketing communications). It is open to all libraries: public, academic, and social. It invites submissions from librarians and library professional working in marketing positions. It publishes research-driven articles that present results of original scholarship and practical articles that focus on best practices and advice.

Open Information Science . Germany. De Gruyter. ISSN: 2451-1781, 2020

The journal publishes research on all areas of library and information sciences. It is cross-disciplinary and single-blind peer-reviewed.

The journal publishes articles about libraries, librarianship, and information science from practitioners across all library sectors. Its sections include Innovations in Practice, for articles that describe and evaluate new library initiatives; Theory and Research, for research articles that can be quantitative or qualitative; and Features.

The journal is student-led and dedicated to promoting the scholarly work of LIS and library tech students and early career information professionals from across Canada. It publishes original scholarship in the fields of library science, information studies, and archives.

Performance Measurement and Metrics: The international journal of library  assessment, value and impact . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. ISSN: 1467-8047. 2000

The journal publishes work that aims to help libraries, museums, and archives to assess their performance, value and impact. Relevant topics include: new approaches to performance measurement and assessment; frameworks for value, assessment, or performance measurement; developments in analytics; ethical issues in performance management; user experience research, and case studies.

Philippine Journal of Librarianship and Information Science . Philippines. University of the Philippines School of Library and Information Studies. ISSN: 2719-0471. 2019 Previous title: Journal of Philippine Librarianship (1968-2018)

This semi-annual journal publishes articles from all fields in the area of librarianship and information studies.

up//root . United States. We Here collective. 2020

up//root is a publishing collective that provides a space for Black and Indigenous folks, and People of Color (BIPOC) to share their research and meditations on their knowledge, experiences, and ways of being in libraries and archives. The publication welcomes experimentation to produce, cultivate, and share knowledge in order to strengthen BIPOC communities and/or inspire action.

Urban Library Journal . United States. Library Association of the City University of New York. ISSN: 1944-9674 , 1944-9682. 1998

The journal publishes work that addresses urban libraries and librarianship in relation to city environments. It welcomes submissions that speak to urban librarianship as it relates to topics in urban studies, higher education (with emphasis on public higher education), public and academic library collaboration, community outreach and programming, social justice, critical race studies, gender and work, sexuality and identity within librarianship, technology and privacy issues, or other topics.

Library Management and Leadership

Journal of Library Administration . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0193-0826 , 1540-3564 . 1980

The journal publishes research, current developments, and trends related to the leadership and management of libraries. Its content is related to public, academic, special, and corporate environments.

Library Leadership & Management . United States. Library Leadership and Management Association,  American Library Association. ISSN: 1945-886X. 2009  Previous Title: Library Administration and Management (1988-2009) 

The journal of the Library Leadership and Management Association, LL&M focuses on assisting library administrators and managers at all levels as they deal with day-to-day challenges. The journal publishes in-depth articles, interviews, and columns with practical advice on managing libraries.

Library Management . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. ISSN: 0143-5124. 1979

The journal publishes articles of interest to senior library managers and academics, reflecting the latest research undertaken in academic, government and corporate institutions. It also explores practical implications for those involved in teaching and practice.

Reference and User Services Quarterly . United States. American Library Association. ISSN: 1094-9054. 1960

The journal publishes content of interest to reference librarians, information specialists, and other professionals involved in user-oriented library services. The scope of the journal includes all aspects of library services to adults in all types of libraries. Its peer-reviewed articles include empirical (quantitative and qualitative), theoretical and historical research, and essays.

Reference Librarian, The . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0276-3877 , 1541-1117 . 1981

The journal publishes articles about all aspects of the reference process, both research-based and applied. It welcomes content on current trends or traditional questions, new electronic tools and resources, best practices in instruction and reference service, analysis of marketing of services, and effectiveness studies.

Reference Services Review . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd. ISSN: 0090-7324. 1973

The journal focuses on the advancement of reference knowledge and the improvement of professional practice. Its articles range from case studies to conceptual papers, and cover all aspects of reference and library user services.

Scholarly Communication

Insights: the UKSG journal . United Kingdom. UKSG in association with Ubiquity Press. ISSN: 2048-7754. 2012 Previous title: Serials: The Journal for the Serials Community (1988 to 2011) 

The journal aims to encourage the exchange of ideas on scholarly communication; their editorial policy is to inform and stimulate debate about issues. They publish articles written by librarians, publishers, vendors, academics and other industry experts, and invite submissions of research articles and case studies. They also commission content such as conference reviews, editorial comment, and features on people in the global knowledge community.

International Journal of Open Educational Resources . United States. Policy Studies Organization. ISSN: 2641-5488. 2018

IJOER publishes research on Open Educational Resources in teaching, learning, scholarship, and policy. Articles focus on topics based upon the Open Educational Research Hub’s 11 hypotheses, which relate to student performance, openness, access to education, student retention, critical reflection by educators, financial benefits, indicators for selecting OER, support for learning, transition to formal education, policy change, and means of assessment.

Journal of Altmetrics .   United States. Levy Library Press. ISSN: 2577-5685. 2018

The journal focuses on alternative metrics (i.e., altmetrics) and welcomes submissions on any aspect of altmetrics or studies that use altmetric data, including papers that explore attitudes towards or use of altmetrics. The journal also encourages student work.

Journal of Copyright in Education and Librarianship . United States. Clemson University Press. ISSN: 2473-8336. 2016 

The journal publishes original articles, reviews, and case studies that analyze or describe the strategies, partnerships, and impact of copyright law on public, school, academic, and digital libraries, archives, museums, and research institutions and their educational initiatives. The journal welcomes original research and practitioner experience papers, legal analysis, as well as submissions in alternative formats.

Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication . United States. Pacific University Library. ISSN: 2162-3309. 2012 

The journal is interested in scholarly communication, particularly the intersection of librarianship and publishing. Authors are encouraged to emphasize the practical applications of their knowledge and findings. Discussions of theoretical models/frameworks, when accompanied by practice-oriented recommendations or examples, are also encouraged. The journal also welcomes articles that include substantive discussion of the impact of library services on scholarly communication, that describe best practices, or that otherwise provide methods of demonstrating the value of library involvement in these activities.

Technology in Libraries

Digital Library Perspectives . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd.. ISSN: 2059-5816. 2016 Previous titles: OCLC Systems & Services (1994-2016); OCLC Micro (1984-1993).

The journal’s focus is digital content collections, publishing research related to the curation and web-based delivery of digital objects, including those in digital libraries and digital repositories.

First Monday . United States. University of Illinois at Chicago. ISSN: 1396-0466. 1996

First Monday is one of the first openly accessible, peer-reviewed journals on the Internet, solely devoted to the Internet. It publishes original research about the Internet and related technologies.

Code4Lib Journal . United States. Code4Lib. ISSN: 1940-5758. 2007

The journal exists to foster community and share information among those interested in the intersection of libraries, technology, and the future. It aims to help engender collective understanding and the necessary support for improving library technology and digital services. Submissions may come in the form of a complete draft or a proposal in the form of an abstract. Submissions are generally reviewed with an editorial process rather than a blind review process.

IASSIST Quarterly . Published by the International Association for Social Science Information Services and Technology (IASSIST). ISSN: 0739-1137. 1977  

The IASSIST Quarterly is a peer-reviewed, indexed, open access quarterly publication of articles dealing with social science information and data services.

Information Technology and Libraries . United States. Library & Information Technology Association, American Library Association. ISSN: 2163-5226 . 1968

The journal publishes original material related to all aspects of information technology in all types of libraries.

Information Technology and People . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd.. ISSN: 0959-3845 1982-1989; resumed 1992

The journal publishes work that is dedicated to understanding the implications of information technology as a tool, resource, and format for people in society as much as in their daily work in organizations. It is open to multiple paradigms of research including most forms of mainstream empirical work. It aims to be an outlet for international, qualitative and critical research in information systems and particularly welcomes cultural and geographic diversity in studies of new and old technologies.

International Journal on Digital Libraries . Germany. Springer-Verlag. ISSN: 1432-5012 , 1432-1300. 1997

The journal examines the theory and practice of acquisition, definition, organization, management, and dissemination of digital information via global networking.

Journal of Critical Digital Librarianship United States. Louisiana State University Libraries. ISSN: 2771-4918. 2021

The journal publishes papers on digital library work, especially critical approaches to topics such as: selection for digitization, metadata remediation, digital humanities, collections as data, and digital library technology. They are particularly interested in work that integrates feminist, antiracist, anticolonial, queer, and other critical frameworks. The journal uses an open peer review process.

Journal of Information Technology . United Kingdom. Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.. ISSN: 0268-3962 , 1466-4437 . 1986

The journal focuses on new research that addresses technology and the management of IT. It publishes work from all disciplinary, theoretical, and methodological perspectives.

Journal of Web Librarianship . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1932-2909 , 1932-2917 . 2007

The journal focuses on all aspects of librarianship as practiced on the World Wide Web, including both existing and emerging roles and activities of information professionals. It publishes original, scholarly research, including empirical studies and case studies, and practical communications. 

Library Hi Tech . United Kingdom. Emerald Group Publishing Ltd.. ISSN: 0737-8831. 1983

The journal publishes empirical, conceptual and methodological contributions on any topics relevant to the broad disciplines of information and communication technologies. It welcomes research that applies a broad array of approaches and epistemologies, including any mix of qualitative, quantitative, mixed-methods, action, participatory, evaluation, design, development or other established methodologies.

Preservation, Digital Technology & Culture Germany. De Gruyter. ISSN: 2195-2957, 2195-2965. 2013. Previous titles: Microform Review (1972-1996), Microform and Imaging Review (1997-2010), Microform and Digitization Review (2011-2013).

The journal publishes articles about preserving digital content from various perspectives, including technological, social, economic, political, and user. It publishes refereed articles, news, and field notes, and welcomes reports on digital preservation projects and research in progress. It welcomes articles that engage theoretical and practical perspectives, from a wide variety of analytic frameworks and methodologies, including empirical, critical, and case study approaches.

Weave: Journal of Library User Experience . United States. Michigan Publishing. ISSN: 2333-3316. 2014

The journal features articles on user experience (UX) for librarians and professionals in related fields. Its primary aim is to improve the practice of UX in libraries, and in the process, to help libraries be better, more relevant, more useful, more accessible places.

Subject-Specific Journals

Art & music.

Art Documentation: Journal of the Art Libraries Society of North America . United States. University of Chicago Press for ARLIS/NA. ISSN: 0730-7187, 2161-9417. 1981. Previous titles: CAA Slides & Photographs Newsletter (1972-1973), ARLIS/NA Newsletter (1974-1980)

The journal publishes articles of interest to librarians working in art history, art criticism, the history of architecture, archaeology, and similar areas. It is a forum for issues relating to both the documentation of art and the practice and theory of art librarianship and visual resources curatorship.

Art Libraries Journal . United Kingdom.  Cambridge University Press, for ARLIS/UK & Ireland. ISSN: 0307-4722 , 2059-7525 . 1976

The journal covers the role of art libraries today, from the impacts on art documentation in a changing research environment, the internet and digital technologies, to themed issues about artists, books, ephemera and online repositories. It welcomes contributions from specialists in art librarianship, archivists, and museum curators.

Published twice a year, the journal includes research articles as well as reports, news, essays, and reviews, with particular focus on music in Canada, music librarianship and archival management, and bibliography. Submissions may also take the form of creative works such as first-person narratives, interviews, memoirs, photo essays, or poetry.

Fontis Artis Musicae . United States. A-R Editions for the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives, and Documentation Centres . ISSN: 0015-6191, 2471-156X. 1954

The journal publishes articles in the area of international music librarianship and documentation, bibliography, audio-visual materials, and musicology.

Music Reference Services Quarterly . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1058-8167 , 1540-9503. 1992

The journal covers all aspects of the management and use of music collections and services in academic, orchestra, public, conservatory, and performing/fine arts libraries, as well as archives and museums. It publishes conceptual papers, literature reviews, practical case studies, and opinion pieces. 

Notes: The Quarterly Journal of the Music Library Association . United States. Music Library Association. ISSN: 0027-4380, 1534-150X . 1934

The journal publishes articles in the areas of music librarianship, music bibliography and discography, the music trade, and on certain aspects of music history.

Journal of Business & Finance Librarianship . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0896-3568, 1547-0644. 1990

The journal covers topics related to business information and business researchers. The focus of the journal is practice-oriented articles, but it also provides an outlet for new empirical studies.

Ticker: The Academic Business Librarianship Review . Academic Business Library Directors. ISSN: 2369-9779. 2015

The journal publishes original research, commentary, conference reports, case studies, renovation profiles, stories of innovation, articles on library management and best practices, and evidence-based pieces. In addition, the journal features examples of translational research -- instances where academic business libraries have implemented faculty research findings on management best practices (i.e., collaboration, work-around techniques, staff motivation, space redesign, vendor negotiations, etc.).

Education Libraries . United States. Special Library Association, Education Division. ISSN: 0148-1061 . 1975

The journal publishes articles that present new and challenging ideas in education, and library and information science. It also explores the effect of new technologies on the library profession and library and information curriculum. Articles should be on topics of interest to the education information professional, and may present research studies or descriptive narratives. 

Government Documents

Government Information Quarterly . United Kingdom. Elsevier Ltd. ISSN: 0740-624X. 1995 Previous title: Government Publications Review (1980-1994), Incorporated the Journal of Government Information (1994-2004).

The journal publishes articles that examine the intersection of policy, information technology, government, and the public. It publishes scholarly research and viewpoint articles that inform both researchers and practitioners. It seeks submissions drawn from various disciplines, including but not limited to information science, public policy, political science, communications, computer science, and public health.

Health and Medical

Health Information and Libraries Journal . United Kingdom. Wiley. ISSN: 1471-1842. 1984

The journal publishes case studies, evaluation and research reports of successful practice. Authors should highlight why their research is relevant for health knowledge services, and health information and library services workers, specifically. It welcomes submissions on topics related to health information behaviour, information retrieval, education and training of health library and information workers, research support services, and more.

Health Information Management Journal . Australia. SAGE Publications for the Health Information Management Association of Australia. ISSN: 1833-3583 , 1833-3575 . 1971

The journal provides a forum for the dissemination of original research and opinions related to the management and communication of health information. Papers will be of interest to researchers, policy makers and governments, health practitioners, teachers, consumers and others with an interest in improving health service delivery and health outcomes for patients and the community.

Journal of Hospital Librarianship . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1532-3269 , 1532-3277 . 2001

The journal focuses on issues that are of vital interest and concern to hospital librarians. The journal provides a forum for research strategies and reporting research results and quality improvement projects in hospital library settings, discussions of technological challenges and solutions, and articles on health care administration issues which have implications for hospital librarians such as managed care health care economics, hospital mergers, as well as patient safety and consumer health information. Editorial Board members mentor new authors to produce a publishable manuscript.

The journal is dedicated to providing a voice for issues and interests shared by Canadian health science librarians and health libraries. Submissions on a wide range of topics will be considered.

Journal of the Medical Library Association . United States. Medical Library Association. ISSN: 1558-6439 . 1911

The journal publishes articles that seek to improve the practice of health sciences librarianship; to extend the knowledgebase on the organization, delivery, use, and impact of information on health care, biomedical research, and health professionals’ education; or to describe important developments in or the history of the health sciences library profession and related fields.

Medical Reference Services Quarterly . United States. Haworth Information Press. ISSN: 0276-3869 , 1540-9597 . 1982

The journal covers topics of current interest and practical value for professionals who provide reference and public services to health sciences personnel in clinical, educational, or research settings. It publishes brief practice-oriented articles relating to medical reference services, with an emphasis on user education, database searching, and electronic information. It also publishes research articles in which practical application is analyzed and clearly presented.

The journal publishes news, developments, articles, reports and reviews of interest to members of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries. Items should be relevant to the field of law librarianship. 

Journal of Law, Information & Science . Australia. University of Tasmania, Faculty of Law. ISSN: 0729-1485. 2005 Previous title: Journal of Law and Information Science (1981-2004)

The journal  is devoted to scholarly research, dialogue and debate about the intersection of law, science and technology. Examples of topics include articles on law and: artificial intelligence/expert systems; computers; intellectual property; genomics; nanotechnology; privacy; bioethics; electronic commerce. It also welcomes articles describing the use of technologies for legal practice or teaching.

Law Library Journal . United States. American Association of Law Libraries. ISSN: 0023-9283. 1908

The journal publishes scholarly articles on law, legal materials, and librarianship. It also includes practice-oriented articles and historical records of the profession of law librarianship. Submissions aimed at all types of law libraries and all areas of library operations are encouraged. Full-issue pdfs are freely available from the journal’s website; enhanced pdfs are available through HeinOnline to subscribers or AALL members.

Legal Reference Services Quarterly . United States. Haworth Press, Inc.. ISSN: 0270-319X , 1540-949X . 1981

The journal publishes articles relevant to law librarians and members of the legal profession. Articles may be serious, humorous, critical, or simply helpful to the working librarian. It publishes annotated subject bibliographies, overviews of legal literature, reviews of commonly used tools, and reference problems unique to corporate law libraries, judicial libraries, and academic collections.

Life and Physical Science

Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship . United States. Association of College and Research Libraries, Science and Technology Section. ISSN: 1092-1206. 1991

The journal publishes substantive content of interest to science and technology librarians. It serves as a vehicle for sci-tech librarians to share successful initiatives and innovative ideas, and to publish peer-reviewed or board-accepted papers, including case studies, practical applications, theoretical essays, web/bibliographies, and research papers relevant to the functions and operations of science and technology libraries in all settings.

Journal of eScience Librarianship. United States. University of Massachusetts Medical School. ISSN: 2161-3974. 2011

The journal publishes articles on the theory and practice of librarianship focusing on services related to data-driven research in science, technology, engineering, math, social sciences, medicine, and public health. It explores the many roles of librarians in supporting eScience and welcomes articles by contributors from all areas of the globe related to education, outreach, collaborations, policy, tools, and best practices. Submissions covering both theoretical and practical applications are welcomed.

Science & Technology Libraries . United Kingdom. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 0194-262X. 1981

The journal covers all aspects of librarianship for librarians who serve science, engineering, clinical investigation, and agriculture. Its content includes original research articles and reports of best practices that further the understanding and management of information resources.

Social Sciences and Humanities

Catholic Library World . Catholic Library Association. ISSN: 0008-820X. 1929

The journal is intended for an audience that is interested in the broad role and impact of various types of libraries. Topics of interest include: academic libraries, high school and children’s libraries, parish and community libraries, archives, and library education. While it is a Catholic publication, it welcomes relevant articles from a variety of religious traditions. 

Journal of Map & Geography Libraries: Advances in Geospatial Information, Collections, and Archives . United States. Taylor & Francis. ISSN: 1542-0353, 1541-0361. 2004

The journal publishes international research on the collecting, organization, and utilization of geographic and cartographic materials and information. It encourages national and international submissions across all disciplines that use geospatial data, collections, and services.

Judaica Librarianship . Association of Jewish Libraries. ISSN: 2330-2976. 2014  Previous title: AJL Bulletin (1983-2013)

The journal provides a forum for scholarship on all theoretical or practical aspects of Jewish Studies librarianship and cultural stewardship in the digital age; bibliographical, bibliometric and comprehensive studies related to Jewish booklore; historical studies or current surveys of noteworthy collections; and extensive reviews of reference works and other resources, including electronic databases and informational websites.

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College & Research Libraries News  ( C&RL News ) is the official newsmagazine and publication of record of the Association of College & Research Libraries,  providing articles on the latest trends and practices affecting academic and research libraries.

C&RL News  became an online-only publication beginning with the January 2022 issue.

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2021–22 ACRL Research Planning and Review Committee

Top trends in academic libraries

A review of the trends and issues

This article summarizes trending topics in academic librarianship from the past two years–a time of tremendous upheaval and change, including a global pandemic, difficult reflections concerning racial justice, and war between nation states. Rapid changes and uncertainty from these events have created a significant amount of shifts to academic libraries, higher education, and society in general. Such shifts have yielded new perspectives and innovations in how librarians approach delivering services, supporting student success, managing staff and physical spaces, embracing new technology, and managing data. This report attempts to provide a snapshot of developments worth noting.

COVID-related trends

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on academic library services has been significant, and these changes, in many cases, are ongoing. The issues identified below transcend the period covered by this review as libraries face a fundamental shift that will extend far into the future and beyond the pandemic. In early 2020, nearly all academic 1 and public 2 libraries closed temporarily and shifted towards virtual services. Despite in-person closures, libraries continued online services, 3 kept their communities informed, 4 and adopted innovative collaborations 5 and technologies to adapt to changing circumstances. These closures and the institutional changes that enabled them had a significant and diverse impact on librarianship, including rethinking long-held paradigms, 6 increased professional stress around institutional budgets, 7 and the ability to work remotely. 8 The pandemic also surfaced long-standing issues of inequality 9 and inaccessibility 10 in libraries. Despite the challenges raised by closures, libraries continued to deliver core services and creative solutions, including virtual reference with increasing complexity, 11 a renewed focus on digital literacy with the rise in online learning, 12 and born-digital collection development. 13

Library staffing challenges

Since early 2020, the pandemic and racial justice protests have drawn increased attention to several trends in library and higher education staffing. Inequities between librarians and other library staff were heightened. One study found many lower-income and lower-status staff were required to work in-person to a greater degree than librarians and administrators. 14 The contradiction between the necessity of these “frontline” and “essential” positions and their lower-rates of financial compensation has become difficult to ignore. Such staff, often quite ably, perform duties that had previously been the purview of credentialed librarians. 15 Additionally, the Bureau of Labor Statistics note that while workers of color represent 25% of the higher education workforce, more than half of individuals who lost jobs during COVID-19 have been nonwhite. 16 Lingering pandemic impacts, such as budget cuts and hiring freezes, have led to inadequate staffing, 17 even as services have largely returned to pre-pandemic levels. Of note is that, partly in response to university pandemic austerity measures, Northwestern University’s library workers announced their unionization with SEIU Local 73, which has been recognized by the university. 18, 19

Low morale continues to be an area of concern in librarianship, 20, 21 particularly for librarians of color, nonlibrarian staff, 22 and members of underrepresented groups. Stress from caretaking responsibilities for workers who lost childcare or other forms of support during the pandemic has exacerbated issues of esprit de corps and well-being in the workplace. For academic librarians, who are pre-tenure or otherwise expected to contribute publications and presentations to library scholarship (and already at a high-stress time in their careers), 23 the pandemic has created additional challenges to those with caretaking responsibilities, particularly women. 24, 25 These workers already experience burnout at higher rates. 26 Future research concerning recruitment and retention may also investigate the benefits and repercussions of library staff working remotely and wanting to continue doing so.

Space utilization

COVID has thrust the physical spaces of libraries, along with most campus facilities, into the forefront of faculty, staff, and student consciousness over the past two years. Balancing demands for the use of current spaces, increases to construction pricing that may extend projects into 2023, and aligning current capital budgets to this reality continue to impact decisions about how existing spaces will evolve in the near future.

Beyond maintaining appropriate distancing or providing adequate sanitization, librarians operating physical facilities are asking questions, including whether and how to operate in-person collaboration spaces safely (for both users and staff), how to provide resources consistently during waves of openings and closures, and how to assess and address patron and staff levels of comfort interacting in a physical space. Rapidly changing methods of service delivery, information access, and materials storage are continuing to generate questions that may possibly reshape the reliance on centralized, in-person settings as more options move online or become embedded externally. 27

Simultaneously, key trends in library design continue to be reassessed and may help inform librarians in the near future. For instance, one study from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln argues that recent trends in library space have overcommitted to collaborative learning spaces at the cost of providing valued space for intensive academic work. 28 Daejin Kim, Sheila Bosch, and Jae Hwa Lee investigated, pre-COVID, how collaboration spaces are used and found that furniture or spaces intended for multiple people are frequently being used by single individuals. 29 Similar studies looking at more nuanced patron needs find that, much like evolving workplace trends, users want a wide variety of space types with different acoustical, privacy, and technology needs according to the work undertaken. 30 Recent studies in other academic settings point to taking this moment of change to pilot new layouts or space configurations that align better with current service needs and that are more activity-based rather than based on type of occupant or user. 31 A multiplicity of trends dominate discussions surrounding space. Accordingly, it is clear that local institutional factors ranging from budget to different use cases will continue to influence how space is allocated, constructed, and used.

Collaborative collections and growth of shared print

While there is a long history of libraries working together to preserve and provide access to rich collections, collaboration around shared print programs has rapidly accelerated in recent years. By creating a collaborative collection, which “elevates the concept of a library collection to scales above a single institution, extending its boundaries to encompass the resources concentrated among a group of libraries,” 32 these programs help research libraries to fulfill their mission to preserve the scholarly record in an era of changing usage, limited funding, and space constraints.

With an initial focus on print journals, shared print programs have matured and evolved to include print monographs more recently. According to Susan Stearns and Alison Wohlers, 33 “over 300 academic and research libraries in the U.S. and Canada participate in some form of shared print program, committing to archive or retain tens of millions of monographs and hundreds of thousands of serial and journal print titles.” A major factor in the growth of shared print monograph initiatives was the launch of the HathiTrust Shared Print Program, which “has now secured commitments on more than 5.4 million individual titles held in the HathiTrust Digital Library.” 34

However, as these programs have grown, so has the need for more coordination, standards, and infrastructure. Several groups have been launched in recent years to tackle these issues. In 2015, the Rosemont Shared Print Alliance was founded to coordinate among regional shared print journal programs in order to archive more titles and ensure sufficient copies are preserved. 35 As a complementary organization, the Partnership for Shared Book Collections was founded in 2019 to collaborate around shared print monographs, aiming to “reduce the cost of retaining the scholarly record” and “develop and promote evidence-based best practices.” 36 Recently the California Digital Library, the Center for Research Libraries, and HathiTrust announced a collaboration around shared print infrastructure intended to develop standards, workflows, and tools to support collaborative efforts and embed shared print work into the lifecycle of collection development and management. 37 In addition, groups such as the Big Ten Academic Alliance, the University of California Libraries, and the Canadian Collective Print Strategy Working Group have embarked on their own initiatives to take more strategic and intentional approaches to collection development and management in light of their shared print collaborations. 38

Finally, it is worth noting that controlled digital lending (CDL) is an emerging trend where libraries “circulate temporary digital copies of print books they own in a one-to-one ratio of ‘loaned to owned,’ removing the print copy from circulation while the digital copy is in use.” 39 ACRL has signed a statement in support of CDL. 40 CDL advocates argue that reasonable interpretation of copyright law should insulate libraries from legal exposure; however, the legality of CDL remains an open question. 41

Open everything

The open access (OA) movement to “make scholarly works both freely available and reusable” continues to be important for librarians, educators, and administrators in higher education. 42 Yet, as Ángel Borrego, Lluís Anglada, and Ernest Abadal, state, the “landscape of scholarly communication is characterized by increasing costs and limited access to research output.” 43 Numerous barriers exist ranging from economics to policy that prevent wide-scale adoption in higher education of executing scholarly communication strategies that would be considered open access. Issues with increasing subscription costs for academic journals are well documented. 44 While librarians typically report favorable beliefs about OA there is a noted lack of OA policy. 45 A report from Hannah Rosen and Jill Grogg, states “while both formal and informal policies exist. . .” regarding OA scholarship, data, and open educational resources, most institutions do not have policies in place “resulting in a scatter-shot approach to open content of all types and less than cohesive institutional strategies.” 46

In addition to further opportunities regarding OA training and outreach, librarians also have opportunities to help with the “identification of, and sometimes deposit into the institutional repository of works that are sitting outside the peer reviewed literature,” often called gray literature. 47 Barriers continue to exist for accessing and using open access information. Some scholars are concerned that open access materials are not understandable to the general public, defeating the point of making such materials open and accessible in the first place. 48 For such reasons there is an increasing call for articles to use a “significance statement,” which describes an article concisely in plain language understandable to a lay audience. 49

The COVID-19 pandemic has provided opportunities for various types of OA content to become more widely available and served as “proof of concept” for what is possible. 50 For instance, OA resources were viewed as important for providing off-campus access to library materials in some developing countries. 51 Some publishers recognized the public health importance of providing timely information related to COVID-19 and committed to open access publication of articles relating to it. 52 Worthy of note were the use of preprint servers by scientists, which “in effect [were] crowdsourcing rapid expert peer-review.” 53 Europe developed an open access publishing initiative—Plan S—in 2018 with support from national research agencies and 12 European countries. As of 2020, notable journals like Nature announced they would facilitate Plan S committing to publishing with full open access in the future. 54

The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) tracks “Big Deal” cancellations, which continue to occur. For instance, Purdue University canceled a $3.3 million contract for 2020 opting instead for a one-year, title-by-title contract for 2021, while New Mexico State University pointed out both inflationary journal prices and COVID-19 considerations while cutting their collections budget by $800,000 for fiscal year 2021. 55 Some universities and consortia are seeking “transformative agreements,” which promote open access publishing by their authors and allow those authors to maintain copyright. Transformative agreements facilitate a more transparent journal licensing process and aim to shift the focus of “scholarly journal licensing from cost containment towards open access publication.” 56

Many facets of the OA movement continue to develop. As libraries continue more aggressive journal subscription negotiations, which may include transformative agreements, as well as possible Big Deal cancellations, 57 more questions will develop about the future of access to scholarly materials. This is multivariable including open data, open educational resources, and OA policies, tools, and advocacy. Combined with the results of unanticipated experiments born from COVID-19, OA continues to be a focal point for academic librarians and administrators.

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence (AI) is being increasingly embedded in academic libraries tools and services. Pattern recognition, 58 AI-powered text recognition, transcription, and searching of historical documents 59 are prime examples that facilitate search and discovery. Keenious, cofunded by the Horizon 2020 program of the European Union, is a research tool for document and writing analysis, attempting to make online research easier. 60 Cactus Communications (CACTUS) recently announced a new AI-powered tool, Paperpal Preflight, “to improve the scholarly publishing experience for researchers, peer reviewers, and journal editors” during the manuscript submission process. 61

The adoption of AI in virtual reference services provides a new online model for libraries by using “chatbots.” 62 Recent attempts to automate standard library operations, such as cataloging, through expert systems have focused on simpler tasks like descriptive cataloging. 63 A team of researchers from the National Library of Norway describes an experiment that uses AI methods to automatically group articles and assign Dewey Decimal numbers to aid in cataloging. 64

The Library of Congress is experimenting with neural networks and the use of computer vision. The intent is to create new online search prototypes that can sort through large amounts of data in new ways, such as examining and contextualizing millions of digitized items that humans could not do alone. 65 Other experimental work like the Newspaper Navigator aims to explore the visual and textual content via AI. 66 At Yale’s Digital Humanities Lab, data-mining techniques are used to illuminate the conventions of portraiture and other visual genres in the 19th century. 67 Leaders, such as Eun Seo Jo and Timnit Gebru, have drawn archives as a model for data collection and annotation in order to inform how decisions that surround fairness, accountability, transparency, and ethics are addressed in machine learning systems. 68

In the Netherlands, concerns that surround data, information ethics, and data-driven public management have been captured under the Data Ethics Decision Aid (DEDA) to use a deliberative rather than rule-based approach to ethical concerns and advance the development of responsible data practices. 69 It is also important to acknowledge cybersecurity concerns as AI becomes more and more embedded in systems routinely used in libraries. 70

While AI technologies could be harnessed to provide more tailored search results, monitor social distancing, and integrate the library into personal assistants, 71 it can also help academic libraries demonstrate real value to institutions if it is used judiciously. Asaf Tzachor et al. expressed concerns stemming from urgency in adopting these technologies along with the challenging ethical issues and risks that can arise in a crisis—the COVID-19 pandemic prevention and response is one example. 72 At the same time, AI’s potential has remained largely untapped among research libraries. A recent Ex Libris survey revealed that while nearly 80 percent of research librarians are exploring the use of AI and machine learning, only about 5 percent are currently leveraging the technology. 73

Higher education faces increased challenges with the surging interest in big data. The need to invest in training skilled employees, increase repository capacity, and assign and clarify responsibilities 74 remains critical as libraries and librarians continue to take on leadership roles 75 and provide data services. Those vanguard libraries that were the first to offer services have begun to evaluate programs, 76 services, 77 and tools 78 and make adjustments focusing both on usability for the owner of the data to upload and share data sets and discoverability of those data sets for the end user. The body of literature associated with research data management services in libraries and skill development has reached the point where literature reviews and scoping reviews are looking back in time to draw conclusions and offer suggestions to advance the field and the libraries’ role. 79

Data mining proves itself as an emerging field as well, especially when linked to the Internet of Things (IoT). A recent study using both Clarivate Analytics Web of Science and Sciverse Scopus revealed that knowledge discovery in databases are paving the way to make data increasingly more meaningful. 80 Along these same lines, data analytic methods are constantly changing with the ever-increasing volume of data generated. As a result, “cloud-based AI activities are expected to increase five-fold by 2023,” 81 which could translate into a greater capacity “to store data in a cost-effective manner and glean more actionable insight from IoT data.” 82

Data curation remains an overarching role for the library. 83 The term active curation, involvement of the curator from collection and development of the data set to its final analysis and storage, 84 will continue to expand as librarians become more embedded in the data life cycle. Additionally, institutions of higher education continue to show a growing interest in data science education. Based on the study conducted at Purdue University in 2017 to examine the roles of academic libraries to support data science education curriculum, results showed that “hard-core” scientific courses for third- and fourth-year STEM students were most common as opposed to offerings in data-oriented skills, such as data management, data ethics, and data communications. 85 At schools of information, a group of instructors who teach data curation have expressed the importance of integrating both research and teaching in the curriculum. The objective would give students opportunities to develop core competencies, learn about data librarianship and practices to support preservation and access, and broaden their professional horizons by gaining a greater awareness with multidimensional problems of working with data. 86

Finally, in light of the growing prominence of data, data visualization skills continue to be highly valued, and visual results can be interpreted as a research product and form of expression. Libraries are taking a greater interest in data visualization as they seek to tell their own story, including assessment, value of the library, collection analysis, and internal capacity building. 87

Critical librarianship

Critical librarianship continues to be an important theoretical perspective for information professionals. Rooted in critical theory (originally denoting a group of Marxist philosophers but over time scholars in many fields now employ critical theory or critical approaches), critical librarianship challenges traditional concepts in librarianship. 88 For instance, critical librarianship argues that libraries are not neutral and challenges librarians to take active steps toward antiracist and antioppresive practices both for the benefit of users but also for the benefit of the profession itself. 89 As libraries continue to aim for accessibility and more welcoming spaces, scholars familiar with critical librarianship, urge library workers to take meaningful action to include its teachings in their daily practice–referred to as praxis. 90 With little diversity in the library professions, 91 and many critiques of popular approaches to information literacy, for instance the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education’s lack of acknowledgement of the underlying power structures in which academia operates, 92 critical librarianship argues that there are numerous opportunities for librarians to fight inequity, racism, sexism, and other problems through concrete action.

One facet of critical librarianship and critical pedagogy is critical information literacy (CIL). CIL literature discusses why and how information professionals should ask questions about power dynamics within academia, equal access to information, and the economic incentives around how information and data are created, stored, and used. CIL scholarship also critiques academia itself. As with other teaching and learning theories, CIL is constantly evolving and must be adapted for students in different course levels and in different course subjects. 93 Margaret Rose Torrell examined implementing CIL when using a writing across the curriculum approach with undergraduates, and highlighted the benefits of having more than a one-shot session with students. 94 Marcia Rapchak employed CIL with graduate students who were “eager to engage in discussion and material,” such as case studies, essays, and self assessments. 95 L Sofia Y. Leung and Jorge R. López-McKnight taught LIS students and found that including and centering intersectionalities such as race and gender in their pedagogical approach allowed them to be better teachers. 96 Erin Fields and Adair Harper incorporated CIL and open pedagogy into a university course and found that by using nonacademic sources and student work, their students were more empowered to work within and assess the current information landscape. 97

Critical approaches to librarianship and information literacy will likely continue to be an area of exploration for LIS scholars.

We foresee numerous challenges in the next few years, including potential budget reductions as well as questions about returning to the physical office after an extended period of virtual work. We are also excited that new opportunities for collaboration, additional interest in critical perspectives, and incorporation of different approaches to manage shared collections will allow academic librarians to continue leading the way in student success and learning, organizational impact, and rigorous scholarly inquiry.

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Why do papers from international collaborations get more citations? A bibliometric analysis of Library and Information Science papers

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• Published: 22 August 2022
• Volume 127 , pages 7517–7555, ( 2022 )

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• A. Velez-Estevez   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0109-0293 1 ,
• P. García-Sánchez   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-4644-2894 2 ,
• J. A. Moral-Munoz   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-6465-982X 3 &
• M. J. Cobo   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6575-803X 4  

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Scientific activity has become increasingly complex in recent years. The need for international research collaboration has thus become a common pattern in science. In this current landscape, countries face the problem of maintaining their competitiveness while cooperating with other countries to achieve relevant research outputs. In this international context, publications from international collaborations tend to achieve greater scientific impact than those from domestic ones. To design policies that improve the competitiveness of countries and organizations, it thus becomes necessary to understand the factors and mechanisms that influence the benefits and impact of international research. In this regard, the aim of this study is to confirm whether the differences in impact between international and domestic collaborations are affected by their topics and structure. To perform this study, we examined the Library and Information Science category of the Web of Science database between 2015 and 2019. A science mapping analysis approach was used to extract the themes and their structure according to collaboration type and in the whole category (2015–2019). We also looked for differences in these thematic aspects in top countries and in communities of collaborating countries. The results showed that the thematic factor influences the impact of international research, as the themes in this type of collaboration lie at the forefront of the Library and Information Science category (e.g., technologies such as artificial intelligence and social media are found in the category), while domestic collaborations have focused on more well-consolidated themes (e.g., academic libraries and bibliometrics). Organizations, countries, and communities of countries must therefore consider this thematic factor when designing strategies to improve their competitiveness and collaborate.

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Introduction

Over the years, literature on international research collaboration (IRC) has reported an increase in international scientific activity (Gazni et al., 2012 ). According to Adams ( 2013 ), this phenomenon of internationalization is a consequence of the increasing complexity of science, since difficult problems require multidisciplinary teams, as well as a large pool of funding resources (Larivière et al., 2015 ). Hence, IRC is considered a strategic approach to enhance the competitiveness and economic wealth and prosperity of nations and communities of countries (European-Commission, 2021 ). Accordingly, nations started to implement science policies to attract new talent, encouraging academics to move abroad and participate in international projects (Suresh, 2012 ).

The global science system has changed toward the internationalization of science, or what is known as the fourth age of research (Adams, 2013 ), and nations assess their competitiveness by measuring their scientific production and impact (Franzoni et al., 2011 ). However, they face the trade-off of cooperating while maintaining a high level of competitiveness (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ). This dichotomy is increasing, mainly in two regards: the knowledge required to be competitive and the assets that the countries exclusively have (i.e., the knowledge needed to be competitive might not be fully covered by the country’s assets), and the part of the knowledge that is produced domestically and that which is produced via international collaboration (Adams, 2013 ).

Mobility and migrant researchers are also increasing, as researchers who move abroad tend to achieve higher impact and enhance their careers (Robinson-Garcia et al., 2019 ; Sugimoto et al., 2017 ). Indeed, mobility is the pathway to IRC (Kato & Ando, 2017 ), and nations might lose this talent if returning policies are not implemented efficiently (Adams, 2013 ).

In this context, IRC has great benefits in terms of increasing impact in comparison with domestic collaboration practices (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ; Gazni et al., 2012 ; Larivière et al., 2015 ; Narin & Whitlow, 1990 ; Persson, 2010 ; Sooryamoorthy, 2017 ; Sugimoto et al., 2017 ), which adds complexity to the problem of designing policies to improve the competitiveness of nations. In this sense, IRC has been studied during the last three decades to try to understand and measure its growth, impact, and causes of its increase, and to aid the design of better science policies (Chen et al., 2019 ). Numerous works have confirmed the increase in collaboration practices (Adams, 2012 ; Fortunato et al., 2018 ; Gazni et al., 2012 ; Larivière et al., 2015 ; Narin & Whitlow, 1990 ). Cultural, political, geographical, and linguistical factors have been shown to influence IRC strongly (Frame & Carpenter, 1979 ; van Raan, 1997 ). With regards to the causes of this increase, self-citations do not seem to be the cause of the difference in impact between international and domestic collaborations (Van Raan, 1998 ), and the aforementioned growth is not uniform between fields of study (Gazni et al., 2012 ). Also, the increased impact of IRC does not affect all countries equally, and indeed a strong dependence on IRC may point to a lack of resources to be independent; countries that do not benefit from IRC may neglect leadership as well as their own development, with negative consequences on linguistic and thematic diversity (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ). Publishing in open access and with international collaborators increases impact (Gabrielle Breugelmans et al., 2018 ). Government funding does not, on average, have a significant effect on the citation impact achieved by IRC studies in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (Leydesdorff et al., 2019 ). However, there are still unexplored factors that may influence the benefits that different countries and organizations obtain from IRC (Chen et al., 2019 ).

Moreover, it is worth mentioning that IRC is not the only factor affecting the impact of papers. Tahamtan et al. ( 2016 ) concluded that three categories of factors might affect the number of citations: paper-related factors (e.g., the quality of the paper, the novelty of the work, and the characteristics of each field), journal-related factors (e.g., the impact factor and scope of the journal, and the form of publication), and author(s)-related factors (e.g., the number of authors, the international and national collaborations of the authors, and their gender, age, and race).

Moreover, the competitiveness of countries can be related to their low dependence on IRC in some scientific fields (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ), and in particular those that are more scientifically relevant (with high relative citation counts). Therefore, to be competitive, it is key to understand the strong themes (in terms of citation impact) that are at the forefront of the research, in which the nations and institutions have low dependencies, to potentiate them even more. In addition, it is also important identifying themes where the nations or institutions are depending too much on external collaboration, which is related to the lack of resources and low competitiveness, to increase their competitiveness in these themes by, for example, attracting foreign researchers or increasing the funding in these topics. Citation impact is partially related to scientific impact as well, as topics with high citation impact hold the attention or interest of the scientific community (Aksnes et al., 2019 ). Nonetheless, the use of citation impact has been criticized by other authors since it does not reflect all the dimensions of scientific impact, such as solidity/plausibility, originality, and societal value (Aksnes et al., 2019 ; Wilsdon, 2015 ). However, citation impact reflects some aspects related to scientific impact and relevance, and has been used as a proxy to carry out research evaluations in different scientific contexts, including institutions, nations Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al. ( 2019 ) and Moed ( 2005 ), and research proposals (Cabezas-Clavijo et al., 2013 ), among others. According to Robinson-Garcia et al. ( 2018 ), other indicators, such as altmetrics, could extend this coverage of impact to some of these other dimensions, e.g., societal impact.

In addition, owing to the increasing availability of digital data (Fortunato et al., 2018 ), new tools to analyze science and detect its patterns have emerged. Bibliographical networks and science mapping analysis tools have taken advantage of this opportunity to better understand science and its evolution (Batagelj & Cerinšek, 2013 ; Cobo et al., 2012 ; Moral-Muñoz et al., 2020 ).

Therefore, to define a strategy for international collaboration, there is first a need to understand the features of international collaboration and what factors are causing its increased citations compared with other types of collaboration. The aim of this paper is to provide insights specifically in this vein, focusing on the theme of collaboration types, as expertise in areas of knowledge is one of the exclusive assets that institutions and nations have in order to be competitive (Adams, 2013 ).

In this paper, we specifically examined the Library and Information Science (LIS) part of the Web of Science database during 2015–2019 through its bibliographical networks, as well as applying science mapping analysis methods. Some works have analyzed themes and research trends in the LIS category (e.g., Bauer et al. ( 2016 ), Galvez ( 2018 ), Han ( 2020 ), Han et al. ( 2014 ), Hsiao and Hua Chen ( 2020 ), Ma and Lund ( 2021 ), Mokhtarpour and Khasseh ( 2020 ), Olmeda-Gómez et al. ( 2017 ), Yan ( 2015 ), Yan et al. ( 2010 )), and the benefits of IRC in LIS have also been confirmed in literature (Asubiaro, 2019 ; Sin, 2011 ). However, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no study has examined the themes and how they are structured in terms of types of collaboration in the LIS field, nor has it been shown whether they might be one of the factors that explain the gain in impact of IRC in LIS.

The main objective of this paper is thus to identify whether the asymmetry in impact between research collaboration types might be caused by thematic and structural factors, which is a key focus in IRC (Chen et al., 2019 ). These factors can be verified at multiple levels, and we focus herein on a comparison of the themes and structure between collaboration types as a whole, as well as at the levels of country and of communities of collaborating countries. Understanding how the knowledge base of a field is disseminated among local, national, and international research, as well as in countries and communities of cooperating countries, is fundamental to help the design of future policies. We thus seek to answer the following research questions:

RQ1 Are there any differences in citation impact between research collaboration types?

RQ2 Are there any topological differences within the conceptual network between the different collaboration types?

RQ3 Are there any topological differences within the social network between the different collaboration types?

RQ4 Are there any differences in themes and their impact on the different collaboration types?

RQ5 Are there any differences in the structure of themes of collaboration types according to the strategic diagram?

RQ6 Are there any differences in top countries according to themes for different collaboration types?

RQ7 Are there any differences in groups of collaborating countries at the international collaboration level according to international themes?

To answer these research questions, the papers in the LIS category published during 2015–2019 were retrieved from the Web of Science database, and the resulting corpus was analyzed by means of science mapping analysis, bibliographical networks, and performance measures.

The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: First, the methodology used to carry out the study is explained. Then, the results obtained are presented and described. Next, the discussion regarding all the results from a “whole” perspective and the findings of the study are presented. Finally, the conclusions and possibilities for future work are described.

Methodology

In this section, the process used to retrieve, analyze, and visualize the data is detailed to address the stated research questions. Before explaining the specific methods used, the retrieval and cleaning of the data are specified. To perform this study, the required data could be retrieved from several bibliographical databases, such as Scopus, Web of Science, Dimensions, or ScholarMetrics, among others (Martín-Martín et al., 2018 ; Visser et al., 2021 ). For this paper, data were collected from the Web of Science using the query WC=“Information Science & Library Science” AND PY = 2015–2019 AND DT = (ARTICLE OR REVIEW) to search in the Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE) and Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI). The authors acknowledge that delimiting the field using a whole category could introduce limitations since some papers might not be related. However, it is important to note that limiting the field of LIS with a query on the basis of keywords is very complex and may introduce biases. Moreover, selecting journals manually also increases the problem of biases. We thus chose to limit the field using a standard category, since this is the best way to ensure an objective and clear criterion to select all papers related to the LIS field. It should also be pointed out that our objective is to analyze the field of LIS rather than a subfield such as bibliometrics.

A cleaning process was then applied to the data by removing papers without affiliations and preprocessing the author’s keywords. After that, the author’s keywords representing the same concept were joined (e.g., artificial neural networks, ANN, neural networks; CRIS, CRIS System; current research information system; h -index, Hirsch index), and authors’ keywords with a broad meaning, known as stop words, were removed (e.g., adolescent/s; algorithm/s; case study/studies; number/s). This preprocessing was performed using the SciMAT software (Cobo et al., 2011b , 2012 ; Moral-Muñoz et al., 2020 ) by joining singular with plural words automatically. After that, the authors of this paper manually revised the whole set of keywords to join them if and only if the words represented the same concept. Next, the “whole” dataset was created, and it was divided into three different collaboration types according to previous studies (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ; Gazni et al., 2012 ):

Local type Papers in this category must include only one organization and one country.

National type Papers with national collaboration must include a number of organizations greater than one and include only a single country.

International type Papers are classified under this category when two or more countries are collaborating.

It is important to clarify that, apart from the aforementioned types of collaboration, this study also utilized the whole dataset. After this common process was finished, the research questions could be addressed by using specific methods over the four datasets obtained (i.e., whole, local, national, and international).

Regarding the question of asymmetry in citation impact between the different collaboration types (RQ1), a variety of indicators related to citation impact, such as the h -index, the geometric mean of citations (Thelwall, 2016 ), and the standard deviation and median of citations, were measured. Moreover, and specifically focusing on highly cited papers (HCP), they were extracted utilizing two methods:

H-classics for each year of the whole dataset, we measure the h -index (Hirsch, 2005 ), and papers belonging to the h -core were identified as HCP (Martínez et al., 2014 ). The h -core is the set of documents with h or more citations, with h being the Hirsch index (Rousseau, 2006 ).

Best 1% for each year of the whole dataset, we sort the papers by number of citations and identify 1% of each year as HCP.

General measures were also computed to understand how papers are divided into the collaboration types, specifically the number of papers, percentage of papers, total citations, number of uncited papers, and percentage of uncited papers.

To address whether the differences in citations could be caused by topological differences in the conceptual (RQ2) or social networks (RQ3), we built two different networks, based on cowords and coauthors. These networks were built using the author’s keywords and author names from each document, which are the nodes in the networks. The edges joining two nodes are representative if two keywords or authors (depending on the network built) appeared together in the documents or not. The network has two attributes: the frequency of a node (i.e., how many times this node appeared in the documents), and the co-occurrence frequency of two nodes (or the weight of an edge), which is the number of times that the two nodes appear together in a document. To precisely address the question of finding social and conceptual topological differences in collaboration types, we computed the following topological properties of the constructed networks: average degree, diameter, assortativity based on the degree, number of components, number of nodes of the biggest component (absolute and relative), average path length, and density. The number of nodes and number of edges were also computed to understand the size of the networks.

Furthermore, to reveal the themes and citation impact in the different collaboration types (RQ4), we detected the communities (themes) in the “whole” coword network, and extracted the citation impact for each of them. To do so, a normalization process was first performed over the frequency of co-occurrence (edge weight) by means of the equivalence index (Callon et al., 1991 ). After that, we extracted the “whole” themes by applying the Leiden community detection algorithm (Traag et al., 2019 ) to the normalized “whole” coword network. The Leiden algorithm was chosen owing to its advantages (e.g., guarantees regarding well-connected communities) over other algorithms.

After extracting the themes, the documents with keywords belonging to each theme were also analyzed. For this study, the documents of a theme are the union of the documents with any of the keywords of the theme. Using these, we measured the citation impact and general indicators of the themes found in the whole network. It is worth mentioning that, in these “whole” themes, the documents can have either local, national, or international collaboration. Therefore, to address RQ4, the global citation impact of each theme was measured by means of the following: citations geometric mean, the h -index, mean normalized citation score (MNCS) (Waltman et al., 2011 ), total and percentage of citations, percentage of uncited papers, and percentage of HCP. The percentage of HCP in each theme was measured in two ways: over the total number of HCP identified in the first research question (regardless of the type of collaboration), and over the number of papers related to the theme. The former facilitates the identification of themes with higher ratio of HCP, with the values being comparable between types of collaboration, while the latter helps to identify high-impact themes in the context of each collaboration type. We also measured the percentage of papers with each collaboration type.

The following citation impact indicators for the “whole” themes and collaboration types were also measured: percentage of uncited papers, citations’ geometric mean, and HCP (percentage of HCP over the total papers with the collaboration type related to the theme). The percentage of papers by collaboration type was also measured to obtain the degree of collaboration of each theme.

To provide a more complete picture of the collaboration types, we also carried out the same process but splitting the dataset before constructing the network. The themes extracted in this analysis thus provide a detailed overview of each collaboration type. For the specific themes extracted from each collaboration type, we measured the same indicators for the “whole” analysis without the specific measures for each collaboration type, as in these themes only papers with a specific collaboration type are found. Therefore, the HCP percentage measure for each theme over the “whole” HCP papers helps to compare the citation impact of particular themes according to collaboration type.

The structure of collaboration types (RQ5) was revealed by measuring the internal and external cohesion of the themes according to their density and centrality. With these two measures, the themes of each collaboration type (i.e., whole, local, national, international) were plotted in a strategic diagram (Cobo et al., 2011a ). The strategic diagram classifies the themes into four categories: motor, basic and transversal, highly developed and isolated, and emerging or declining. Motor themes (upper right) are those related externally to concepts that are applied to other themes that are conceptually close. Highly developed and isolated themes (upper left) have strong internal links, but not important external ties so have marginal importance for the field. In the bottom left part, themes are weakly developed and marginal, mainly representing emerging or disappearing themes. Themes in the bottom right part of the diagram are basic and transversal, since they have strong ties with the rest of themes but are not developed. The themes were labeled by selecting the most central keyword of the cluster. Using this analysis and these visualizations, the differences and similarities of the structure between collaboration types were studied.

Moreover, to analyze the differences of top productive countries according to the themes (RQ6), the relative contribution of each one in relation to the themes in each type of collaboration was compared. To achieve this, we focused on the top ten countries globally (i.e., selecting the top ten countries with the most papers published in the whole dataset). For each type of collaboration, the top five countries not included in the global ranking were selected as well. In the case of the whole network, we focused on the top 15 countries. Consequently, we could observe how the research output of top countries was distributed throughout the themes and compared the “whole” ones concerning the types of collaboration. To complement the analysis of top countries by collaboration type, we also studied the coauthors’ networks of each top country, thereby showing how the knowledge base of countries varies according to collaboration practices.

Regarding the above-mentioned fourth age of research, as countries cooperate among themselves, it is interesting to study the communities of countries and their respective knowledge bases (themes) (RQ7). To do so, we built a co-country network using the international collaboration dataset. We then applied the Leiden algorithm over the whole co-country international network (Traag et al., 2019 ) to find communities of countries that collaborate together. Subsequently, we obtained the distribution of the papers in the international themes extracted when answering RQ4. Finally, once the results were obtained and combined with the performance measures of the detected themes, we studied how research in communities of countries varies, taking into consideration the impact of the themes.

According to the methodology described in “ Methodology ” section, a bibliometric analysis was performed, aiming to analyze whether one of the factors for the increase of IRC impact is the existence of a difference in the conceptual structure of collaboration types. A total of 22,127 papers were retrieved on 6 October 2020 using the advanced query explained above.

Differences in the citation impact (RQ1)

To address RQ1, we carried out a quantitative analysis of the impact according to collaboration type as explained in “ Methodology ” section. The results (Table 1 ) showed that there exists a difference in impact, as noted in the geometric mean of citations. This benefit can also be seen in the number of HCP, either by 1% or the H-classics method, as they increase when the collaboration level is higher, whereas the proportion of uncited papers decreases accordingly. Papers with local collaboration represent half of the total, while national and international papers accounted for the rest, with similar amounts.

Note that 1801 papers had no affiliation information (i.e., neither the country nor the organization) and were discarded (these 1801 papers represent 8.13% of the 22,127 papers). Therefore, the sum of the papers from the three types of collaboration was not equal to the total number of retrieved papers.

Boxplot of local, national, and international collaboration citations. The number of citations is plotted on a log scale; zeros were treated by adding one to each value of the distribution

In addition, as shown in Fig. 1 , there is a pattern in the citation distributions of the types of collaboration. As the collaboration level increases, the number of outliers decreases, and the citation distribution shifts to higher citations. This can be noticed in the maximum number of citations without outliers, as well as the median of citations, which is higher in each collaboration type than in the previous one (local < national < international).

In addition, as shown in Fig. 1 , the maximum of citations without outliers is higher when the collaboration level increases, and the outliers are more reduced in national and international collaboration in comparison with the local collaboration type. The 25% of most cited papers increases when the academic collaboration is higher; this can be noticed by the third quartile being higher in each collaboration type.

Topological analysis of conceptual networks (RQ2)

Analyzing the conceptual and social structure of the LIS field is fundamental to discovering their effects on the scientific impact of collaboration levels. Aiming to understand how scientific impact of collaboration types may be influenced by social and conceptual structures, we studied the coauthor and coword networks. Therefore, Tables 2 and 3 present different measures to characterize the coword and coauthor collaboration networks: the size of each collaboration network (#nodes), the number of links between them (#edges), the average number of edges incident on nodes (Avg. degree), the largest distance between any pair of nodes (diameter), the tendency of a node to be linked to similar nodes on the basis of the degree (assortativity), the number of network-independent components, the number of nodes in the biggest component (#Nodes P. Component), the percentage of nodes of the biggest component [Nodes. P. Component (%)], the average number of steps to reach any possible node (Avg. path length), and the density of the network (i.e., the percentage of edges of the possible ones in a complete network). We found that the conceptual networks do not follow any pattern on the basis of the degree of their nodes, as there is no assortativity based on the degree (i.e., there is no degree-based homophily), as presented in Table 2 . In fact, this shows that specific concepts with low connections can be interrelated with each other and with other strongly connected concepts in the network following no pattern.

Topological analysis of social networks (RQ3)

In the social network (Table 3 ) the number of authors is very similar, with the exception of the local collaboration type, which has around 3000 more authors compared with the rest. The average degree of national and international social networks is higher, which means that the social network of authors is bigger, on average, for these collaboration types. Also, the assortativity is remarkable in the case of the international social network, which points to strong homophily on the basis of the links between authors.

Components are very reduced in the international collaboration network compared with the rest, and the number of nodes in the largest component is also greater. The average path length between nodes in the national and international collaboration types is much shorter than in the local collaboration type. All of this means that authors are closer to other authors (i.e., the number of researchers between a researcher and the rest of the network is smaller), increasing the opportunity to collaborate.

Themes and structure of the collaboration types (RQ4 and RQ5)

In this section, we present the themes detected for each collaboration type and for the whole dataset in different subsections, and in each subsection, the themes and their performance measures are described (RQ4). In each subsection, the structure of the collaboration type is also revealed by plotting out the themes in a strategic diagram, which is then commented upon to address RQ5. On the basis of these results, RQ4 and RQ5 will be discussed globally.

Before presenting the results of the themes, it is important to clarify that, in the rest of the paper, the name of the themes will be shown in italic. Moreover, bold themes in the performance and impact measures tables are the ones with the highest impact (MNCS). It is also important to point out that a theme is composed of a sub-coword network; thus, the nodes enclosed in a theme could determine the concepts on which the theme is focused.

LIS whole themes

The “whole” strategic diagram is shown in Fig. 2 . For these themes, the general performance measures are presented in Table 4 while the collaboration-type-related measures are presented in Table 5 . As Fig. 2 shows, the primary “whole” themes in the field were: bibliometrics , focused on citation, altmetrics, and social network analyses; academic libraries , focused on information literacy, collaboration, and higher education; and social media , focused on social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. Other themes are also distinctive owing to the mean normalized impact they achieved: big data , related to natural language processing, sentiment analysis, and text mining; knowledge management , related to knowledge sharing and information management; and information retrieval , related to search engines and meta-analysis.

Whole dataset strategic diagram. The number under the themes signifies the number of papers that belong to that theme

Concerning the themes with the highest impact, the results show that most of the themes were related to new technologies. In fact, big data , social media , information and communication technology , information retrieval , or e-government are very important in the LIS category regarding the impact they achieved. In contrast, more traditional themes, such as academic libraries , qualitative research (i.e., information behavior, digital libraries), or content analysis , are below the world average citation in the field (MNCS < 1).

Moreover, focusing on the high-impact themes and the uncited papers within them, papers with international collaboration contributed more in relative terms to impact, since there were fewer uncited papers with international collaboration. In almost all the themes, the HCP were also international, and it is important to note that the national and local HCP were usually found in high-impact themes.

As can be seen in Table 5 , themes that achieved an above-average impact mostly have an intense degree of international collaboration. However, an important part of the high-impact themes were papers with local collaboration. In themes with an impact above the world average (MNCS > 1), HCP were mainly found in the international collaboration type, while the percentage of uncited papers was higher in the domestic collaboration types (i.e., local and national).

In addition, most of the international papers were found in high-impact themes (except for bibliometrics ). Thus, international papers not only acquired a high impact in these themes, but national and local papers also increased it (see CGMI, CGMN, and CGML in Table 5 ) compared with other themes, such as health communication or academic libraries . In contrast, international papers in more traditional themes, such as those mentioned above, acquired very low impact compared with other themes.

From this perspective, international collaboration within a theme had, in most cases, more citations than local or national collaboration (except in the themes of electronic health records , grounded theory , and health communication ). The impact of the theme will thus depend on the topic in question, meaning that papers on technological themes may have more impact than papers on traditional themes, and local papers on high-impact topics may have a greater impact than international papers on traditional topics. For instance, a local paper published on the big data theme may achieve a higher impact, on average, than an international paper on the academic libraries theme. This reinforces the idea that the themes are an important factor in the impact achieved by collaboration types, since a high proportion of papers with international collaboration belonged to high-impact themes (e.g., big data, social media).

Low-impact themes were less international, the percentage of uncited papers was higher, and the number of HCP was lower in them, independent of collaboration type. However, in the low-impact themes, the collaboration type with the most uncited papers was local collaboration, and HCP were mainly international. Although the international collaboration papers contributed to the impact of low-impact themes, it is noted how the international uncited papers, as well as the percentage of HCP, decreased when compared with modern themes such as big data or social media . This also suggests an influence of the themes on the scientific impact of collaboration types.

Nonetheless, as presented in Table 5 , not all of the high-impact themes had a high rate of papers with international collaboration, although there were some noteworthy exceptions. For instance, the theme information retrieval had high normalized impact, but it was more present in the local collaboration type than in the international one. Additionally, this theme had a minimal number of uncited international papers while maintaining a high degree of HCP in all three types of collaboration. In contrast, bibliometrics is a theme with an appreciable degree of international collaboration, but remained in the middle- to high-impact themes. Moreover, it was the most important theme in our study considering the number of papers, but the percentage of HCP, either 1% or H-classics, was lower than in other themes, regardless of collaboration type.

Regarding the structure of the LIS “whole” themes, the category was focused on themes such as bibliometrics , academic libraries , or health care , which are motor and basic themes. However, it is observed that the themes with the highest number of citations and proportion of HCP were other themes that are neither motor nor basic, implying that the themes that achieved high scientific impact are novel themes and do not belong to the core of the conceptual structure. In the coming years, these novel themes will probably become more integrated into the category.

Local collaboration

As shown in Fig. 3 and presented in Table 6 , local collaboration focused on the following themes: Academic libraries related to information literacy, collaboration, and higher education; bibliometrics related to citation analysis, altmetrics, and social network analysis; and social media related to topics such as social networks, social networking sites, and political communication. In addition, new technologies such as big data have a place in this collaboration type, focusing on concepts such as e-government, transparency, open data, and developing countries. Yet another important theme was information and communication technology , which is related to content analysis, digital media, and journalism.

Local collaboration strategic diagram. The number under the themes signifies the number of papers that belong to that theme

The themes with the strongest impact were internet of things and digital divide . The former is related to digitalization, academic librarians, and blockchain, which is a new technology, while the latter is related to cloud computing, user experience, and customer relationship management. These last two themes had a MNCS of 2.32 and 1.41, respectively, as presented in Table 6 . In contrast, the themes that achieved less impact were academic libraries and information science , with MNCS of 0.63 and 0.68, respectively. HCP were mostly found in technology-related themes, such as digital divide , social media , and big data , but also in bibliometrics . This collaboration type also provides a high number of HCP with respect to the total of the whole dataset, although it must be pointed out that local collaboration contained 49.98% of the corpus. Interestingly, the most productive themes in the local collaboration type had a remarkable rate of uncited papers, which may indicate lower impact (MNCS).

Regarding the structure of local collaboration, high-impact themes (i.e., digital divide , internet of things ) were found on the left-hand side of the strategic diagram (low centrality). As noted in the previous section, this implies that high-impact themes were novel themes that do not belong to the core of the LIS category.

National collaboration

The following themes regarding national collaboration type were addressed in Fig. 4 and Table 7 : bibliometrics , academic libraries , and social media , all focusing on the same topics as in local collaboration type; and electronic health records , which adds new technologies to the health context, such as machine learning and natural language processing.

National collaboration strategic diagram

The strongest themes in terms of impact were electronic health records and patient portals , with MNCS of 1.56 and 1.63, respectively, as presented in Table 7 . The patient portals theme focused on mobile health and electronic health. Otherwise, the themes with lower impact were academic libraries and ontology (e.g., information retrieval, data sharing, and interoperability topics). The HCP were mainly found in themes related to health and technology, such as electronic health records , social media , patient portals , and innovation (i.e., patents and information and communication technology). Uncited papers were also reduced in the same type of themes as HCP, which increased their impact. However, the contribution of national collaboration to the percentage of HCP over the whole dataset was very low, despite national papers representing 23.39% of the whole.

In the national collaboration structure, neither motor nor basic themes were found among the high-impact ones (e.g., innovation and social network analysis ). Similar to local collaboration, high-impact themes in national collaboration were novel themes that were not a part of the LIS category’s core.

International collaboration

Finally, as shown in Fig. 5 and presented in Table 8 , the themes at the international collaboration level have some similarities but also many differences from the other collaboration types: academic libraries , strongly related in this case to data mining, content analysis, and text mining; developing countries , focusing on topics such as information and communication technology and small and medium enterprises; social media and bibliometrics , focusing on the same concepts as for the other collaboration types; knowledge management , focusing on knowledge sharing, innovation, and knowledge transfer; and themes focused on artificial intelligence (AI), such as sentiment analysis , big data , natural language processing , and machine learning .

Also, the international collaboration type, as shown in Fig. 5 and presented in Table 8 , was focused on some themes that also appeared in the other collaboration types, e.g., academic libraries , social media , and bibliometrics . Moreover, some themes that only appeared in this type of collaboration are developing countries , which focused on information and communication technology and small and medium enterprises; sentiment analysis , which is related to artificial intelligence; and the themes natural language processing and machine learning . The bibliometrics theme, which focuses on similar topics in all the considered types of collaboration (e.g., citation analysis and altmetrics, among other topics), is an example of a theme that has similarities to other themes. In addition, social media is shared between all the collaboration types, aggregating topics such as social networks and political communication.

International collaboration strategic diagram

However, looking at the differences, academic libraries , also related to artificial intelligence concepts such as data mining and text mining, had twice the normalized impact in this type of collaboration. Moreover, new themes centered on the development of artificial intelligence techniques, which did not appear in the other types, are: sentiment analysis , applied to concepts such as online reviews and electronic commerce; machine learning , related to ethnography and topic modeling; and, big data , which aggregates the internet of things and cloud computing, including resource-planning topics.

The theme with the strongest impact was literature review , which contained papers carrying out systematic literature reviews and meta-analyses on information systems and enterprise architecture, obtaining a MNCS of 3.13, as presented in Table 8 . In addition, the artificial intelligence themes obtained a high impact; indeed sentiment analysis , big data , machine learning , and natural language processing had twice the expected average impact (MNCS > 2). In contrast, more traditional themes, such as higher education and health care , obtained a lower rate of 0.97 and 1.27 MNCS, respectively, and not all the themes had a remarkable number of HCP. Nonetheless, the number of uncited papers in the themes was very low compared with the rest of the collaboration types. HCP were mostly found in technology-related themes, such as social media , knowledge management , or sentiment analysis , and it is important to mention that themes of this type of collaboration contribute, in the same way as in local collaboration, to the global number of HCP, despite the former only accounting for 26.63% of the corpus.

The high-impact and technology-related themes were structured as motor and basic themes in the structure of international collaboration in LIS, in contrast to domestic collaboration, so these themes made up the core of international collaboration. Moreover, motor and basic themes had higher centrality (i.e., are strongly linked to the rest of the themes), which explains the rise in scientific impact of the rest of the themes.

Themes in top countries (RQ6)

The results of the analysis of themes in top countries for each type of collaboration, as well as for the whole dataset, are described in the next subsections to address RQ6.

Top “whole” countries

Figure 6 shows the themes of the top 15 countries in the world by scientific output. The themes of academic libraries , bibliometrics , knowledge management , and social media were well represented in all countries. Other themes, such as content analysis , gender , grounded theory , and health communication , were weakly present in almost all countries.

Themes in top countries (whole). ICT is an abbreviation for information-and-communication-technology. (Color figure online)

Some themes were relevant only to specific countries, such as in the case of content analysis in Spain, or classification in Brazil. Additionally, some countries were more concerned with high-impact themes than others; for example, India, South Korea, Taiwan, and China dedicated around half of their scientific output to big data , e-government , information retrieval , knowledge management , social media , and information and communication technology . South Africa also dedicated almost 50% to academic libraries and bibliometrics .

Top local collaboration countries

Themes of top countries (local collaboration). The top five countries of local collaboration are highlighted in bold. ICT is an abbreviation for information-and-communication-technology. (Color figure online)

Most of the themes strongly appeared in all the countries in terms of local collaboration (Fig. 7 ), whereas some were marginal. In fact, themes such as academic libraries , bibliometrics , social media , and knowledge management were powerfully present in all the countries. In contrast, marginal themes such as archives , digital communication , and smartphones had a low representation in all the countries.

There were also particular countries in which some themes were not present, such as in the case of the Netherlands, in which neither the digital communication nor smartphone themes were present, or Australia, which also did not have studies in the smartphone theme. Regarding specific countries with a special interest in specific themes, the case of Spain is noteworthy, with a focus on the digital communication theme, in which Spanish authors published 50% of the total papers.

Concerning countries focused on high-impact themes, Table 6 shows that the two themes that achieved the highest impact were internet of things and digital divide . In Fig. 7 , it is seen that the former acquired a high interest in relative terms from India and South Korea, while the latter was well represented by all the countries, although South Korea, the Netherlands, and Germany should be highlighted because they dedicated a large amount of attention to this theme.

On the other hand, taking into account the social structure of each country in the local collaboration, in Table 9 it is seen that the average degree was lower than 3, except for in China, where the value was fairly low, as will be introduced later. There were also some important values to highlight, such as the assortativity based on degree being very close to zero in Germany, China, South Korea, and Taiwan. This means that authors of these countries collaborated with others regardless of their importance in the network. In contrast, in other countries such as the United Kingdom or France, authors with a large number of connections collaborated, in most cases, with similar ones, while the same occurs with authors with fewer connections. This shows that some countries had different types of relationships when collaborating locally.

Top national collaboration countries

Themes of top countries (national collaboration). The top five countries of national collaboration are highlighted in bold. (Color figure online)

Regarding the national collaboration type, Fig. 8 shows the relative number of papers in themes published by countries in the national collaboration type. Analyzing this figure, it is noted that some themes were strongly underrepresented, such as empowerment , medical informatics , lived experience , and patient portals . Nonetheless, several themes that were well structured among the countries, such as academic libraries (except for Italy), bibliometrics , social media , and social network analysis , were also identified.

In terms of how countries structured their research output, a minority were present in all the themes (i.e., the USA, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom), and the countries mentioned were also quite similar concerning their themes, whereas the rest varied (e.g., the USA is quite different from Spain in bibliometrics , electronic health records and patient portals ).

Although all the countries had some similarities in this type of collaboration, it is worth noting that each country focused on its conceptual niche. The most remarkable cases were India and France, with the former mainly focusing on social media , ontology , bibliometrics , and social network analysis , and the latter focusing more on bibliometrics , electronic health records , social network analysis , and social media . It is also worth mentioning the case of Italy, which focused around 50% of national collaboration on bibliometrics .

The presence of some high-impact themes in most countries, such as electronic health records and social media , is remarkable. Nonetheless, not all countries were equally interested in the previous themes (e.g., Australia or Canada were loosely interested, in comparison with the USA or France). There were also other high-impact themes, such as patient portals and medical informatics , which received minimal attention from most countries.

With respect to the coauthor network of each analyzed country, the average degree in national collaboration was generally higher than in local collaboration (Table 10 ). The assortativity also tended to increase, which reveals how the relationships between authors differ between types of collaboration. These measures may explain why countries focus much more on high-impact themes compared with local collaboration, owing to, for example, sharing of resources between organizations in the same country.

Top international collaboration countries

Finally, Fig. 9 shows the conceptual structure of top countries in the international collaboration type. Themes of this type of collaboration were prevalent in almost every country. The themes that did not have universal presence were collaboration , digital divide , health care , and peer review , which were not present in Malaysia, Sweden, Taiwan, and South Korea, respectively.

Themes of top countries (international collaboration). The top five countries of international collaboration are highlighted in bold. (Color figure online)

The countries were very similar concerning the themes, although in the cases of Brazil and Spain both were very interested in higher education , while other countries had less interest. In addition, Brazil had a low focus on sentiment analysis in comparison with the rest.

High-impact themes (e.g., literature review , sentiment analysis , and big data ) were present in every country. The relative number of papers published on these themes in each country was similar. However, there were some special cases where some themes did not appear in specific countries, such as sentiment analysis in Brazil or big data in the Netherlands.

Finally, the measures of the social structure of each country in the international collaboration (Table 11 ) are presented. In these networks, the average degree of the authors in the network (i.e., the average number of links they have with other authors) differed strongly from the rest of the collaboration types, with the exception of the largest countries (i.e., the USA or China). The assortativity was also much closer to 1, which reveals strong links between similar-degree authors, which may affect the visibility of the papers and increase their probability of being cited. Nonetheless, China differed from other countries in that there was no pattern of collaboration, with authors both related to similar and non-similar ones (based on the degree). Strong links between different countries tended to homogenize the thematic landscape owing to the sharing of resources and knowledge, enabling these more modern and citable topics to be addressed.

Themes in country communities (RQ7)

As stated in the methodology, the Leiden algorithm was applied over the co-country network to identify communities of countries. The relative contribution of groups of collaborating countries to international themes is shown in Fig. 10 .

Thematic breakdown of groups of collaborating countries. (Color figure online)

Before describing the results of Fig. 10 , it is vital to understand the nature of the eight groups of countries obtained. The ten most relevant countries making up the groups, in terms of production, are presented in Table 12 . In this table, countries in italics only appeared in the international collaboration; That is, in the LIS category during 2015–2019, they only had papers in collaboration with other countries but never alone. The eight groups obtained can be described as follows:

Group 1 Most European countries, as well as a significant portion of Asian and North American countries, were included in this group. It is also worth noting that 23 of the countries in this category were not involved in any local or national collaboration (e.g., Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, and Mozambique, among others). This group of countries was the most productive, as it is the largest and contains the top producing countries, such as the USA and China.

Group 2 This group consists primarily of Middle Eastern countries (i.e., Cyprus, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, and Turkey), Eastern European countries (i.e., Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, and Romania), and some African countries (i.e., Botswana, Morocco, Libya, Oman, and Ethiopia), among others. Turkey, Bangladesh, and Jordan were the most productive countries in this group. Furthermore, only five nations in this group (i.e., Bhutan, Palestine, Libya, Moldova, and Mongolia) had no presence in the other collaboration categories.

Group 3 Several African countries belong to this group, being geographically very close. This group also included five countries that only published papers by taking advantage of international collaboration (i.e., Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Liberia, Senegal, and Swaziland).

Group 4 This group included only Latin American countries. This aggregation of countries has six countries that were closely linked to international collaboration since they did not appear in the other collaboration types (i.e., Bolivia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Panama, Paraguay, and Venezuela).

Groups 5–8 These groups were the smallest ones. Groups 6 and 7 comprised countries appearing only in the international collaboration. Group 8 was formed by only two countries. Furthermore, they were very isolated since the low production of their members results in their being slightly bound to the main component of the co-country network.

Having identified the groups, the presence of international themes in them can be analyzed. First, almost all themes were poorly present in groups with limited scientific production (i.e., groups 6–8). In contrast, it is noted that nearly all the groups in groups 1–5 were represented in each theme. The only exceptions include digital divide and sentiment analysis , in which the fifth group was not present.

Focusing then on the conceptual analogies between the communities of countries, it is observed that groups 1, 2, and 3 were extremely similar (except for the social media and higher education themes). Moreover, the group of Latin American countries (group 4) is close to the previous groups but with a low focus on knowledge management and more interest in bibliometrics .

The presence of high-impact themes (i.e., literature review , big data , machine learning , natural language processing , sentiment analysis , and social media ) is thus very relevant. In fact, the relative number of papers on the aforementioned themes is above 20% in groups 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7. The group with the highest presence of high-impact themes was the first, corresponding to nearly one-third of its relative production. In contrast, the lowest attention was received from the group of African countries (group 3), at approximately 18%. Moreover, it is worth highlighting the interest of group 5 (Niger, Nicaragua, and Burkina Faso) in big data . A special interest in low-impact themes ( digital divide and higher education ) via international collaboration was seen for groups 3–5 and 8.

In this paper, the LIS category during the period 2015–2019 was examined to analyze whether the themes and structure of collaboration types are important factors that may explain the increase in IRC citations. In this regard, and concerning RQ1, IRC yields a higher impact in terms of citations, which has already been stated in several works examining the LIS category of Web of Science (Asubiaro, 2019 ; Sin, 2011 ), and other works in different fields of science (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ; Gazni et al., 2012 ; Larivière et al., 2015 ; Narin & Whitlow, 1990 ; Persson, 2010 ; Sooryamoorthy, 2017 ; Sugimoto et al., 2017 ). HCP were mainly found in themes with high IRC, which is in line with the results obtained by Persson ( 2010 ), however, according to our results, HCP are not found in the same proportion as IRC among the themes covered by the category, so the thematic dimension must also be taken into account when designing strategies for IRC.

The topology of the conceptual networks is similar, so they do not seem to be an important factor contributing to the asymmetrical impact of the collaboration types (RQ2). In contrast, the social network topology differs (RQ3), showing two main aspects: authors in IRC networks have a large social neighborhood, and authors relate to authors with a similar number of relationships. Important authors tend to work with other important authors, as opposed to domestic collaboration, where this tendency is less pronounced. Although authors have a very good network of collaborators, self-citations have been rejected as a sole factor explaining the increasing impact of IRC (Van Raan, 1998 ). Nonetheless, in our study, the probability of being cited by non-collaborators and/or researchers is higher, as papers in these IRC networks may have greater visibility, which advances the conclusions made by Yan et al. ( 2010 ), who found that central authors correlate with citations.

Regarding the thematic landscape of the LIS category (RQ4), there are some thematic similarities according to collaboration types. The similarities noted are: bibliometrics , which is present in the three collaboration types and has a similar impact on all of them; social media , which is quite similar and highly related to social networks, but in international collaboration is a stronger theme in terms of MNCS; and health care , which is very similar in the three collaboration categories as well, focusing on topics such as education, culture, and patient safety. In fact, there are two health-related themes in the three collaboration types: empowerment , which is about physical activity and mental illness; and gender , which is about how gender relates to health, race, and information technology. All of them have about the same impact in all the collaboration types. Furthermore, academic libraries , which is related to collaboration and information literacy, is also similar. Nevertheless, in the international sphere, computer science (e.g., data mining and text mining, among others) plays an important role in this theme. In fact, the MNCS of academic libraries increased significantly in the international collaboration type and reached twice the impact acquired in the local and national collaboration types.

In this sense, it is important to highlight that the roles played by artificial intelligence (AI) and social media topics in the articles of the LIS category were also introduced in previous works (Hsiao & Hua Chen, 2020 ; Ma & Lund, 2021 ), but we found that these specialized themes were placed in the international collaboration type. In fact, our results show that there are multiple thematic differences that can explain the asymmetrical impact of collaboration types in LIS. Indeed, while in the local and national collaboration, AI topics are more spread throughout the themes and received much less attention, in the international collaboration type, they are made up of four specific themes: natural language processing , big data , sentiment analysis and machine learning (which has the highest MNCS), with almost all of them reaching twice the average citation rate of this category. Furthermore, the bibliometrics theme in international collaboration is related to AI topics such as data mining and text mining, and literature review , which is in the international collaboration type, focuses on the revision of previous works on enterprise architecture and information systems and has the highest impact. There are also other themes with a significant impact: social networking sites and collaboration . These novel and technological themes mostly come from international collaboration, where multidisciplinarity, a mix of knowledge, and the skills of teams play an important role (Larivière et al., 2015 ; Suresh, 2012 ), which may explain the increase of citations, as they are at the vanguard of LIS scientific production.

Hence, technological themes may achieve greater impact than traditional themes. Therefore, a local paper in a high-impact theme may achieve a higher impact than an international paper in a low-impact theme. For instance, a local paper on big data may achieve more citations, on average, than a paper with international collaboration on academic libraries (see the measures of the whole LIS themes). In fact, a theme with remarkable international collaboration does not always mean higher impact (see bibliometrics , grounded theory , caregivers , or gender at the “whole” themes) and a low degree of international collaboration does not mean low impact either (see information retrieval ). These may be influenced by other aspects, which are very interesting for the competitiveness of countries, such as funding-biased policies in some areas, as in the case of information retrieval from 1998 to 2008 as reported by Zhao ( 2010 ).

Moreover, regarding the structure of the LIS field according to the strategic diagram (RQ5), the high-impact themes were structured as non-motor themes when examining the whole category of LIS. From this perspective, the conceptual structure of LIS focuses on bibliometrics and academic libraries , which have been reported to be stable topics in the area (Hsiao & Hua Chen, 2020 ; Ma & Lund, 2021 ). However, themes with the highest impact are other themes that are structured as emerging (i.e., big data , knowledge management ), or very specialized, such as information retrieval , according to their position in the strategic diagram. Big data - and knowledge management -related topics were reported as an emerging trend in LIS by Ma and Lund ( 2021 ). This implies that the themes achieving high scientific impact do not belong to the core of the LIS category.

Continuing with the results of the structure of the specific collaboration types, in international collaboration, the high-impact themes are structured as motor and basic themes ( natural language processing , sentiment analysis , and collaboration ), and thus are salient in the rest of the international works (i.e., very central themes), and the internal development of these themes is high (i.e., very dense themes). Meanwhile, in domestic (i.e., local and national) collaboration, the high-impact themes are shown to be less central, which indicates that they are not used in the rest of the works at such levels of collaboration.

Therefore, there are many thematic and structural differences according to the strategic diagram that explain the asymmetrical impact of the collaboration types (RQ4 and RQ5). Domestic collaboration in LIS is focused on stable themes such as bibliometrics and academic libraries , and minor works are dedicated to new themes. However, for international collaboration, motor themes are new themes that lie at the forefront of the LIS category. It is important to highlight that these new themes have emerged in a relatively short period of time (Ma & Lund, 2021 ). This result is relevant for future studies on policy implications, as a key assumption might be that a variation in the collaboration patterns and/or in the themes may change the impact of an institution or a nation. Hence, future studies should examine the importance of being at the vanguard of scientific fields, taking into account the degree of international collaboration needed to develop those particular themes. Nations and institutions should also update their internal studies on the thematic and collaboration landscape from time to time to verify whether they are at the vanguard of the field, and how much dependence on collaboration they need Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al. ( 2019 ) to advance in these topics to make decisions aided by a good assessment of the situation.

Differences in the themes of top countries (RQ6) were found mainly concerning some countries, such as South Africa, which had a large amount of its research output dedicated to two traditional themes, while others were focused on high-impact and new themes, such as China, Taiwan, or India. This shows that there is room for competitiveness in the LIS area, as there is a variation in the knowledge base of countries; however, they must design strategies to ensure a path and clear goals for the specific themes. In contrast, and regarding the themes of specific collaboration types, the difference in themes between countries in domestic collaboration is much higher than in international collaboration. For international collaboration, the thematic landscape of the countries is mostly homogeneous, which might reveal a tendency toward a common international agenda. This is a problem, as noted by Adams ( 2012 ), because these strategies can end up being driven by a bland establishment consensus, which can ultimately lead to some researchers in underdeveloped nations abandoning project leadership, thus reducing thematic variety (Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al., 2019 ). Countries and organizations should examine their knowledge and expertise, and identify those that differentiate them from the rest where they can lead research to be in the forefront of the fields of study. This will lead to better understanding of their competitive assets, while contributing to the wealth of scientific development and thematic diversity.

Eight communities of countries were identified herein with a remarkable thematic difference between them (RQ7). In previous literature, Leydesdorff and Wagner ( 2008 ) found a core group that includes the most international collaborations, which also exists in our study, involving all the well-established economies and top countries, plus 23 countries that appear only when collaborating internationally. This core group is the one that focuses much more on high-impact themes. Moreover, there are seven other groups in which the formation seems to be guided by cultural, linguistic, and/or political factors (Frame & Carpenter, 1979 ; van Raan, 1997 ). There is a community of African countries, which were also previously reported in literature (Adams et al., 2014 ) and which is dedicated to stable and less impactful themes. It is also important to highlight some practices; for example, the community of countries of Niger, Nicaragua, and Burkina Faso is very interested in big data , being at the forefront of the field. As can be seen, the core group leads the vanguard of research in LIS, while the rest of the communities of developing countries differ in their strategy. There are some countries in these communities that only appear at the international collaboration level, which seems to be caused by the lack of resources in their research systems, as pointed out by Chinchilla-Rodríguez et al. ( 2019 ).

Therefore, the themes and how they are structured in the LIS field are two crucial factors affecting the increasing impact of IRC in the category. These themes, which are structured as motor and basic themes in the international collaboration research, lie at the forefront of the LIS field and must be considered by organizations and nations to understand the impact of IRC. A suggestion emerging from this paper is that future studies should look further into including the thematic and collaborative factors, studying their possible implications for scientific policy design.

Finally, the results of this paper are only for LIS, while future studies should confirm whether these results are consistent in other fields/areas of knowledge. Therefore, the results are not generalizable, and other fields have to be studied specifically, since in some fields, such as computer science, there are less emergent technologies related to other fields of science or no major differences between collaboration levels (Velez-Estevez et al., 2020 ) that contribute to the scientific knowledge of the area itself. With regards to the limitations, the methods employed in this paper are difficult to apply to the social sciences and humanities, since citation-based indicators are less representative of the research impact of these disciplines (Waltman, 2016 ).

Conclusions

An analysis of the asymmetry in the impact of research collaboration types according to themes is presented herein. To achieve this, the LIS category was examined between the years of 2015 and 2019 (both included). The key finding of this paper is that the increased impact of IRC seems to be explained by a special focus on the forefront of research in the LIS category, which has been found to be an important factor. Therefore, we shed new light on the potential factors influencing the benefits of IRC. The forefront of research is mostly present in IRC of LIS, with emergent technologies applied in the field of study (i.e., artificial intelligence or social media, among others), while domestic research focuses on stable themes (i.e., academic libraries or bibliometrics).

Our findings also point out that differences in themes are present at the top country level (i.e., those with more scientific output), mostly in domestic collaboration. In contrast, IRC homogenizes the research, which could be a risk because it may lead to vague priorities around peer consensus research without a clear goal for organizations and nations. Communities of countries also exhibit a large difference in the thematic aspect, indicating that there is room for competitiveness and a need for future studies concerning policies at the community level on the basis of these results, which might enhance the research systems of developing communities of countries, and also might help the core group to maintain their research system.

Moreover, organizations, countries, and communities of countries may update the analysis of their situation from time to time to check their position in the thematic landscape and at the domestic and international collaboration levels, identifying whether themes are at the vanguard of the field, to precisely design and revise their strategies for both domestic improvement and IRC strategies.

While thematic and structural factors are important in IRC, it can also be influenced by other factors, such as publication location, funding, research leadership, or publishing in open access. Therefore, future research on this topic should consider these other variables to demonstrate what was stated in this study.

Finally, although the results of this paper emphasize the thematic implications in different collaboration types, some limitations should also be noted: Only one database (Web of Science) was considered, and only the Library and Information Science category and the period of 2015–2019 were covered. Regarding the scope of our research, future studies must incorporate additional databases, different research categories, and a longer period to check whether these results are generalizable. New studies could also enrich these types of analyses with altmetrics or leadership indicators to reveal the possible societal impact of research carried out on the different collaboration levels and themes, and to observe the dominance of countries and/or communities of countries in the IRC landscape.

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Acknowledgements

This paper extends our contribution presented at ISSI 2021 Velez-Estevez et al. ( 2021 ). It has also been supported by the Spanish State Research Agency through project PID2019-105381GA-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 (iScience).

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Velez-Estevez, A., García-Sánchez, P., Moral-Munoz, J.A. et al. Why do papers from international collaborations get more citations? A bibliometric analysis of Library and Information Science papers. Scientometrics 127 , 7517–7555 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-022-04486-4

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