Knowledge mapping of research data management
Uncovering themes and developments through co-occurrence and bibliometric analysis
Downloads
Background of the study: Discussions on RDM have grown rapidly in scholarly platforms, emerging as a key topic within library and information science (LIS). While existing studies have reviewed and analyzed RDM literature, their scope is often limited to specific areas or timeframes. It is necessary for a detailed and current analysis of RDM literature, providing deeper insights into its complexities, evolution, and future directions.
Purpose: The study presents mapping knowledge domains as a method to uncover the thematic landscape, identify significant clusters, and provide a structured understanding of interconnected concepts within the field of RDM.
Method: Data were retrieved from Elsevier’s Scopus database as of August 2023. The study conducts bibliometric analysis to examine geographical distribution, publication outlet, authorship trends, and performance metrics within the field.
Findings: The dataset spans from 1977 to 2023, with an increase in publications exceeding ten per year from 2012 onwards, amounting to 684 documents in various languages and reference types. The study identifies four research clusters derived from these documents, highlighting key themes namely, RDM services, data sharing, information systems, and data management.
Conclusion: The findings underscore the growth of RDM-related research and contribute to a deeper understanding of the underlying structure of RDM, for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers, enabling them to address current challenges and anticipate future developments in this rapidly evolving field.
Downloads
Ahmi, A., Rahim, S. A., & Elbardan, H. (2018). A global trend of the electronic supply chain management (e-SCM) research: A bibliometric analysis. International Journal of Supply Chain Management, 7(5), 535–542.
Al-Lawati, E. H., Abdul Kohar, U. H., & Shahrin Suleiman, E. (2022). Entrepreneurial culture in educational institutions: A scoping review. Cogent Business and Management, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/23311975.2021.1997237
Ashiq, M., Usmani, M. H., & Naeem, M. (2022). A systematic literature review on research data management practices and services. Global Knowledge, Memory and Communication, 71(8–9), 649–671. https://doi.org/10.1108/GKMC-07-2020-0103
Avuglah, B. K., & Underwood, P. G. (2019). Research data management (RDM) capabilities at the University of Ghana, Legon. Library Philosophy and Practice, 2019. https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85066066748&partnerID=40&md5=52b10dfefaa0f4cef9146b7930947bea
Aydinoglu, A. U., Dogan, G., & Taskin, Z. (2017). Research data management in Turkey: perceptions and practices. Library Hi Tech, 35(2), 271–289. https://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-11-2016-0134
Baas, J., Schotten, M., Plume, A., Côté, G., & Karimi, R. (2020). Scopus as a curated, high-quality bibliometric data source for academic research in quantitative science studies. Quantitative Science Studies, 1(1), 377–386. https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00019
Bourke, P., & Butler, L. (1996). Publication types, citation rates and evaluation. Scientometrics, 37(3), 473–494. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02019259
Bunkar, A. R., & Bhatt, D. D. (2020). Perception of researchers & academicians of Parul university towards research data management system & role of library: A study. DESIDOC Journal of Library and Information Technology, 40(3), 139–146. https://doi.org/10.14429/djlit.40.3.15302
Chawinga, W. D., & Zinn, S. (2020). Research data management at an African medical university: Implications for academic librarianship. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 46(4), 102161. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2020.102161
Cox, A. M., & Pinfield, S. (2014). Research data management and libraries: Current activities and future priorities. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 46(4), 299–316. https://doi.org/10.1177/0961000613492542
Finkel, M., Baur, A., Weber, T. K. D., Osenbrück, K., Rügner, H., Leven, C., Schwientek, M., Schlögl, J., Hahn, U., Streck, T., Cirpka, O. A., Walter, T., & Grathwohl, P. (2020). Managing collaborative research data for integrated, interdisciplinary environmental research. Earth Science Informatics, 13(3), 641–654. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12145-020-00441-0
Flores, J. R., Brodeur, J. J., Daniels, M. G., Nicholls, N., & Turnator, E. (2015). Libraries and the research data management landscape. In The Process of Discovery: The CLIR Postdoctoral Fellowship Program and the Future of the Academy (pp. 82–102). http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub167/
García, J. A., Rodriguez-Sánchez, R., & Fdez-Valdivia, J. (2011). Ranking of the subject areas of Scopus. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 62(10), 2013–2023. https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.21589
Gupta, N., Arora, S., & Chakravarty, P. R. (2021). Science mapping and visualization of Research Data Management (RDM): Bibliometric and scientometric study. Library Philosophy and Practice, 2021(September), 1–23.
Harrison, R. (2018). The academic library and the research office: Providing scholarly communications support at Imperial College London-A Case Study. In Collaboration and the Academic Library: Internal and External, Local and Regional, National and International (pp. 143–150). Elsevier. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-102084-5.00013-4
Ismail, M. I., Abrizah, A., & Samsuddin, S. F. (2021). Mapping the knowledge domains of research data management: A co-occurrence analysis. Reimagining Libraries for a Post-Pandemic World: Proceedings of the International 8th Conference on Libraries, Information and Society, ICoLIS 2021. http://commonrepo.um.edu.my/12794/
Koltay, T. (2016). Facing the challenge of data-intensive research: Research data services and data literacy in academic libraries. In W. Baker, D and Evans (Ed.), Innovation In Libraries and Information Services (Vol. 35, pp. 45–61). Emerald Group Publishing Limited. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0732-067120160000035008
Kruse, F., & Thestrup, J. B. (2014). Research libraries’ new role in research data management, current trends and visions in Denmark. LIBER Quarterly: The Journal of the Association of European Research Libraries, 23(4), 310–335. https://doi.org/10.18352/lq.9173
Lam, W. H., Lam, W. S., Jaaman, S. H., & Lee, P. F. (2022). Bibliometric analysis of information theoretic studies. Entropy, 24(10), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.3390/e24101359
Li, X., Wu, P., Shen, G. Q., Wang, X., & Teng, Y. (2017). Mapping the knowledge domains of Building Information Modeling (BIM): A bibliometric approach. Automation in Construction, 84(September), 195–206. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.autcon.2017.09.011
Li, Y., Dressel, W., & Hersey, D. (2019). Research data management: What can librarians really help? 20th International Conference on Grey Literature: Research Data Fuels and Sustains Grey Literature, GL 2018, 2019-Decem(1), 67–74. https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85062960063&partnerID=40&md5=843ffb6d2b81174ab2cc46b010199f5a
Liu, L., & Mei, S. (2016). Visualizing the GVC research: a co-occurrence network based bibliometric analysis. Scientometrics, 109(2), 953–977. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-016-2100-5
Lozano, S., Calzada-Infante, L., Adenso-Díaz, B., & García, S. (2019). Complex network analysis of keywords co-occurrence in the recent efficiency analysis literature. Scientometrics, 120(2), 609–629. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-019-03132-w
Marlina, E., & Purwandari, B. (2019). Strategy for research data management services in Indonesia. Procedia Computer Science, 161, 788–796. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2019.11.184
Martín-Martín, A., Thelwall, M., Orduna-Malea, E., & Delgado López-Cózar, E. (2021). Google Scholar, Microsoft Academic, Scopus, Dimensions, Web of Science, and OpenCitations’ COCI: A multidisciplinary comparison of coverage via citations. Scientometrics, 126(1), 871–906. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-020-03690-4
Mosconi, G., Li, Q., Randall, D., Karasti, H., Tolmie, P., Barutzky, J., Korn, M., & Pipek, V. (2019). Three gaps in opening science. Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW), 28(3–4), 749–789. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10606-019-09354-z
Mushi, G. E., Pienaar, H., & van Deventer, M. (2020). Identifying and implementing relevant research data management services for the library at the University of Dodoma, Tanzania. Data Science Journal, 19(1). https://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-001
Nitecki, D. A., & Davis, M. E. K. (2019). Expanding academic librarians’ roles in the research life cycle. Libri, 69(2), 117–125. https://doi.org/10.1515/libri-2018-0066
Osareh, F. (1996). Bibliometrics, citation analysis and co-citation analysis: A review of literature II. Libri, 46(4), 217–225. https://doi.org/10.1515/libr.1996.46.4.217
Perrier, L., Blondal, E., Ayala, A. P., Dearborn, D., Kenny, T., Lightfoot, D., Reka, R., Thuna, M., Trimble, L., & MacDonald, H. (2017). Research data management in academic institutions: A scoping review. In PLoS ONE (Vol. 12, Issue 5). Public Library of Science. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0178261
Pinfield, S., Cox, A. M., & Smith, J. (2014). Research data management and libraries: Relationships, activities, drivers and influences. PLoS ONE, 9(12), e114734. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0114734
Rice, R. (2019). Supporting research data management and open science in academic libraries: A data librarian’s view. Mitteilungen Der Vereinigung Österreichischer Bibliothekarinnen Und Bibliothekare, 72(2), 263–273. https://doi.org/10.31263/voebm.v72i2.3303
Salazar, A., Wentzel, B., Schimmler, S., Gläser, R., Hanf, S., & Schunk, S. A. (2023). How research data management plans can help in harmonizing open science and approaches in the digital economy. Chemistry - A European Journal, 29(9), 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1002/chem.202202720
Schirrwagen, J., Cimiano, P., Ayer, V., Pietsch, C., Wiljes, C., Vompras, J., & Pieper, D. (2019). Expanding the research data management service portfolio at Bielefeld University according to the three-pillar principle towards data FAIRness. Data Science Journal, 18(1), 1–10. https://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2019-006
Schöpfel, J., Ferrant, C., André, F., & Fabre, R. (2018). Research data management in the French National Research Center (CNRS). Data Technologies and Applications, 52(2), 248–265. https://doi.org/10.1108/DTA-01-2017-0005
Shiffrin, R. M., Bö, K., & Borner, K. (2004). Mapping knowledge domains. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 101(Supplement 1), 5183–5185. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0307852100
Stopar, K., & Bartol, T. (2019). Digital competences, computer skills and information literacy in secondary education: mapping and visualization of trends and concepts. Scientometrics, 118(2), 479–498. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-018-2990-5
Sweileh, W. M., Al-Jabi, S. W., AbuTaha, A. S., Zyoud, S. H., Anayah, F. M. A., & Sawalha, A. F. (2017). Bibliometric analysis of worldwide scientific literature in mobile - health: 2006-2016. BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making, 17(1), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12911-017-0476-7
Tammaro, A. M., Matusiak, K. K., Sposito, F. A., & Casarosa, V. (2019). Data curator’s roles and responsibilities: An international perspective. Libri, 69(2), 89–104. https://doi.org/10.1515/libri-2018-0090
Tang, H., Gao, K., Zhou, Y., Zheng, W., Yang, X., & Zhao, J. (2018). Adopting data analysis and visualization technology to construct clinical research data management and analysis system. ACM International Conference Proceeding Series, 49–53. https://doi.org/10.1145/3301761.3301767
Timmermann, M. (2019). A collective challenge: Open Science from the perspective of Science Europe. Mitteilungen Der Vereinigung Österreichischer Bibliothekarinnen Und Bibliothekare, 72(2), 424–430. https://doi.org/10.31263/voebm.v72i2.2831
Van Eck, N. J., & Waltman, L. (2020). VOSviewer manual. In Leiden: Univeristeit Leiden (Issue November). University Leiden.
van Eck, N. J., & Waltman, L. (2020). VOSviewer Manual version 1.6.16. Univeristeit Leiden, November, 1–52. https://www.vosviewer.com/download/f-33t2.pdf
van Eck, N. J., Waltman, L., Eck, N. J., & Waltman, L. (2017). Citation-based clustering of publications using CitNetExplorer and VOSviewer. Scientometrics, 111(2), 1053–1070. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-017-2300-7
Vilar, P., & Zabukovec, V. (2019). Research data management and research data literacy in Slovenian science. Journal of Documentation, 75(1), 24–43. https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-03-2018-0042
Wahid, R., Ahmi, A., & Alam, A. S. A. F. (2020). Growth and collaboration in massive open online courses: A bibliometric analysis. International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 21(4), 292–322. https://doi.org/10.19173/IRRODL.V21I4.4693
Wiljes, C., & Cimiano, P. (2019). Teaching research data management for students. Data Science Journal, 18(1), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2019-038
Wiorogórska, Z., Leśniewski, J., & Rozkosz, E. (2018). Data literacy and research data management in two top universities in Poland. Raising awareness. In 5th European Conference on Information Literacy in the Workplace, ECIL 2017 (Vol. 810, pp. 205–214). Springer Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74334-9_22
Zhang, L., & Eichmann-Kalwara, N. (2019). Mapping the scholarly literature found in Scopus on research data management: A bibliometric and data visualization approach. Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication, 7(1). https://doi.org/10.7710/2162-3309.2266
Zhang, Y., Hua, W., & Yuan, S. (2018). Mapping the scientific research on open data: A bibliometric review. Learned Publishing, 31(2), 95–106. https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.1110
Zhu, L., Liu, X., He, S., Shi, J., & Pang, M. (2015). Keywords co-occurrence mapping knowledge domain research base on the theory of big Data in oil and gas industry. Scientometrics, 105(1), 249–260. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-015-1658-7
Zhu, X., & Zhang, Y. (2020). Co-word analysis method based on meta-path of subject knowledge network. Scientometrics, 123(2), 753–766. https://doi.org/10.1007/S11192-020-03400-0
Copyright (c) 2025 Mohd Ikhwan Ismail, A. Abrizah, Samsul Farid Samsuddin

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Record and Library Journal by Unair is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
1. The journal allows the author to hold the copyright of the article without restrictions.
2. The journal allows the author(s) to retain publishing rights without restrictions
3. The legal formal aspect of journal publication accessibility refers to Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC BY-SA).
4. The Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) license allows re-distribution and re-use of a licensed work on the conditions that the creator is appropriately credited and that any derivative work is made available under "the same, similar or a compatible license”. Other than the conditions mentioned above, the editorial board is not responsible for copyright violation.