The Knowledge Base and Research Front of Information Science 2006-2010: An Author Cocitation and Bibliographic Coupling Analysis

This study continues a long history of author cocitation analysis (and more recently, author bibliographic coupling analysis) of the intellectual structure of information science (IS) into the time period 2006 to 2010 (IS 2006-2010). We find that web technologies continue to drive developments, especially at the research front, although perhaps more indirectly than before. A broadening of perspectives is visible in IS 2006-2010, where network science becomes influential and where full-text analysis methods complement traditional computer science influences. Research in the areas of the h-index and mapping of science appears to have been highlights of IS 2006-2011. This study tests and confirms a forecast made previously by comparing knowledge-base and research-front findings for IS 2001-2005, which expected both the information retrieval (IR) systems and webometrics specialties to shrink in 2006 to 2010. A corresponding comparison of the knowledge base and research front of IS 2006-2010 suggests a continuing decline of the IR systems specialty in the near future, but also a considerable (re) growth of the webometrics area after a period of decline from 2001 to 2005 and 2006 to 2010, with the latter due perhaps in part to its contribution to an emerging web science.