Co-authorship networks and thematic development in Chinese outbound tourism research

Abstract

Owing to the increasing number of contributions, related topics that were addressed, and contributing authors, Chinese outbound tourism was established as a research field in the mid-2000s. The purpose of this paper is to review the literature in the field via analysis of collaboration patterns and thematic development using a bibliometric approach. One-hundred and twenty-one academic articles published between 2006 and 2016 are retrieved from 16 tourism journals, and a relational analysis is performed by creating co-authorship and co-keyword networks. The results offer networks of collaborations between authors, institutions and the geographical origins of the research. This network analysis permits exploration of linkages among central authors and institutions. In addition, the results identify and discuss six main thematic areas of research. Significant structural characteristics of the research field, implications and unexplored research themes are presented and discussed. 随着研究者数量及研究话题的日益增加，中国出境旅游在21世纪初期逐渐成为一个研究领域。本文运用文献计量方法，通过对2006年至2016年间发表于16个主要旅游期刊的121篇学术论文的合作模式和研究主题的发展进行分析，创建作者合作（co-authorship）和共同关键词（co-keyword）网络。分析结果揭示了作者、作者所属机构和所在地之间的合作网络，以及主要作者和机构之间的联系，并对现有文献中主要涉及的六个主题进行了讨论。