A Bibliometric Network Analysis of Coronavirus during the First Eight Months of COVID-19 in 2020

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021 Jan 22;18(3):952. doi: 10.3390/ijerph18030952.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all aspects of society. Researchers worldwide have been working to provide new solutions to and better understanding of this coronavirus. In this research, our goal was to perform a Bibliometric Network Analysis (BNA) to investigate the strategic themes, thematic evolution structure and trends of coronavirus during the first eight months of COVID-19 in the Web of Science (WoS) database in 2020. To do this, 14,802 articles were analyzed, with the support of the SciMAT software. This analysis highlights 24 themes, of which 11 of the more important ones were discussed in-depth. The thematic evolution structure shows how the themes are evolving over time, and the most developed and future trends of coronavirus with focus on COVID-19 were visually depicted. The results of the strategic diagram highlight 'CHLOROQUINE', 'ANXIETY', 'PREGNANCY' and 'ACUTE-RESPIRATORY-SYNDROME', among others, as the clusters with the highest number of associated citations. The thematic evolution. structure presented two thematic areas: "Damage prevention and containment of COVID-19" and "Comorbidities and diseases caused by COVID-19", which provides new perspectives and futures trends of the field. These results will form the basis for future research and guide decision-making in coronavirus focused on COVID-19 research and treatments.

Keywords: COVID-19; SciMAT; bibliometric analysis; co-word analysis; coronavirus; pandemics; strategic intelligence; virus diseases.

MeSH terms

  • Bibliometrics*
  • COVID-19*
  • Databases, Bibliographic / trends*
  • Humans
  • Pandemics*