7.2 Bibliometric Analysis .1 Data and Methodology
7.2.2 Empirical Results
7.2.2.1 Document Types and Languages
There were four document types were identified among 975 publications on virtual reality in education. The most common document type is peer-reviewed journal articles (930), accounting for 95.3% of the total. Proceeding papers were identified to account for 3.3%. The other documents were review (8) and editorial letter (4).
All peer-reviewed journal articles were used for the further analysis because they are more prevalent document type and provide more information to identify research trends. As much of 99.7% of the journal articles were published in English.
This result shows that English dominates the official international academic lan- guage for research in virtual reality.
7.2.2.2 Major Journals and Their Publication
Articles on virtual reality were published in wide range of 75 SCI/SSCI journals.
Table7.1 lists the top 20 most productive journals in virtual reality research in education, along with the total number of articles published, the number of LCS and GCS. The major journals for virtual reality research included Computers &
Education, Journal of Surgical Education, International Journal of Engineering Education, and Educational Technology & Society. In Computers & Education, 139 articles, or 14.9% out of the 930 journal articles, were published, and received 370 LCS and 3292 GCS. The journalJournal of Surgical Educationranked second in terms of publication numbers, with 74 published articles and 31 LCS and 585 GCS. These results indicate that Computers & Educationis the most outstanding journal in virtual reality research.
7.2.2.3 Most-Prolific Authors
A total of 2383 authors (co) produced just one article, accounting for approximately 89% of the total authors. Table7.2lists the top 10 most-prolific authors, each with no less than 5 articles. The most productive author was Roshan Aggarwal from Faculty of Medicine, Imperial college London, U.K, with 8 articles, 6 LCS and 168 GCS. Most of the top productive authors are from English- speaking countries. This result reveals that English-speaking countries is dominating virtual reality research field.
Table 7.1 Top 20 most productive journals based on total number of articles published
Journal TA LCS GCS
1 Computers & Education 139 370 3292
2 Journal of Surgical Education 74 31 585
3 International Journal of Engineering Education 39 18 179
4 Educational Technology & Society 38 44 406
5 Computer Applications in Engineering Education 35 33 173
6 British Journal of Educational Technology 33 110 828
7 Anatomical Sciences Education 31 84 414
8 Interactive Learning Environments 30 23 134
9 Medical Teacher 27 44 1422
10 Academic Medicine 25 13 672
11 Journal of Computer Assisted Learning 24 34 392
12 IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies 22 12 136
13 Australasian Journal of Educational Technology 17 8 65
14 BMC Medical Education 16 0 183
15 Journal of Educational Computing Research 16 4 68
16 Journal of Science Education And Technology 16 39 235
17 Medical Education 16 79 943
18 ETR&D-Educational Technology Research And Development 14 54 408
19 Nurse Education Today 13 2 90
20 IEEE Transactions on Education 12 15 224
Note TATotal number of articles,LCSLocal citation scores,GCSGlobal citation scores
Table 7.2 Top 10 most-prolific authors based on total number of articles published
Author Country TA LCS GCS
1 Aggarwal R UK 8 6 168
2 Darzi A UK 8 13 342
3 Wilson TD Canada 7 23 92
4 Goktas Y Turkey 6 5 14
5 Hwang GJ Chinese Taipei 6 7 85
6 Kneebone R UK 6 15 388
7 Passig D Israel 6 3 8
8 Ahmed K UK 5 3 34
9 Bjerrum F Denmark 5 0 16
10 Dasgupta P UK 5 3 34
7.2.2.4 Geographic Distribution and International Collaboration
A total of 59 countries/regions contributed to virtual reality research. However, only 19 countries/regions (32.2% of the total) published more than 10 articles, and 15 countries/regions (25.4% of the total) produced only one article. USA was the most productive country with 316 articles, followed by U.K (100). Table7.3lists the top 10 most productive countries/regions in virtual reality researchfield. Among the top 10 prolific countries/regions, 4 countries are English-speaking countries and their total output accounted for 540 articles, 58.06% of the total. Interestingly, Chinese Taipei and Peoples R China are the two emerging Asian countries/regions which listed in top 10. Figure7.4 displays the network visualization among the countries/regions for virtual reality research.
The institutional distribution of virtual reality research is also uneven geo- graphically. A total of 930 articles were distributed over 903 institutions, however, 610 institutions, or 67.5% of the total institutions produced only one article.
Table7.4lists the top 10 research institutions involved in virtual reality research.
7.2.2.5 Highly Cited Papers
From Table7.5, it is clear that most of the research related to VR has been con- ducted in medical education. Applications of VR in school and university teaching and learning is yet still need a lot of attention from the educators and stakeholders.
7.2.2.6 Most Frequently Used Keywords
A total of 2103 keywords were extracted. This includes author keywords and keywords plus. Keyword Plusare the indexing keywords which are provided by WoS. Table7.6lists the top 10 keywords which were used frequently. The top 10
Table 7.3 Top 10 most productive countries/regions based on total number of articles published
Country/Regions TA LCS GCS
1 USA 316 469 5884
2 UK 100 131 1935
3 Chinese Taipei 94 153 938
4 Canada 70 85 643
5 Spain 64 56 584
6 Australia 54 42 563
7 Peoples R China 38 22 279
8 Netherlands 26 3 230
9 Turkey 23 20 202
10 Greece 21 29 408
high frequency keywords were used for 541 times, accounting for 25.7% of the total keyword frequency appearances. From Fig.7.5, it is found that there has been wide application of virtual reality in medical education.
Table 7.4 Top 10 productive research institutions of virtual reality research in education
Institutions Country/Region TA LCS GCS
1 Taiwan Normal University Chinese Taipei 22 48 227
2 Taiwan University of Science &
Technology
Chinese Taipei 17 55 303
3 Central University Chinese Taipei 16 23 139
4 Harvard University USA 15 46 458
5 University of Toronto Canada 14 2 107
6 Arizona State University USA 12 14 120
7 Imperial College London England 12 11 282
8 University of Western Ontario Canada 12 28 136
9 University of Illinois USA 10 7 127
10 Bar-Ilan University Israel 9 8 26
Fig. 7.4 The network of top 20 countries/regions involved in virtual reality research