An emerging field: An evaluation of biomedical graduate student and postdoctoral education and training research across seven decades

Abstract

Biomedical graduate student and postdoctoral education and training research has expanded greatly over the last seven decades, leading to increased publications and the emergence of a field. The goal of this study was to analyze this growth by performing a cross-sectional bibliometric analysis using a systematic approach to better understand the publishing trends (including historical vs. emerging themes and research priorities); depth, structure, and evidence-basis of content; and venues for publication. The analysis documented a dramatic increase in biomedical trainee-related publications over time and showed that this area of research is maturing into its own independent field. Results demonstrated that the most frequently published article types in this field are shorter editorial and opinion pieces, and that evidence-based articles are less numerous. However, if current trends continue, projections indicate that by the year 2035, evidence-based articles will be the dominating article type published in this field. Most frequently published topics included career outcomes and workforce characterization and professional development. In recent years, the most cited articles were publications focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion, career outcomes and workforce characterization, and wellness. This study also shows that although a small subset of journals publishes most of this literature, publications are distributed diffusely across a wide range of journals and that surprisingly 68% of these journals have published only a single article on the topic. Further, we noted that the assignment of author- and index-supplied keywords was variable and inconsistent and speculate that this could create challenges to conducting comprehensive literature searches. Recommendations to address this include establishing standard keyword assignment criteria and proposing new index-supplied keywords to improve accessibility of research findings. These changes will be important for bringing visibility of this literature to our community, institutional leaders, national trainee organizations, and funding agencies.