Metaverse: an emerging research area

Abstract

Introduction: the progress of science and technology has allowed the advancement of informatics equipment, connectivity and virtuality, giving rise to new technologies such as metaverses. Objective: to describe the trends in scientific output on the metaverse in Scopus and the Web of Science. Method: bibliometric study of articles published in Scopus and the Web of Science concerning the metaverse in the period 1995 - 2022. Search formulas were used to retrieve the articles. Productivity indicators were studied. Results: 76,82 % and 67,46 % of metaverse articles in Scopus and Web of Science respectively were published in the period 2020-2022. China and USA were identified as the most productive countries (Scopus: 17,82 % vs 16,17 %; Web Of Science: 19,69 % vs 17,81 %) and Sabancı Üniversitesi (n=28) and Chinese Academy of Sciences (n=26) as the most productive institutions. A predominance of original articles and articles in English was found; the most productive areas were Computer Science and Information Systems and the area of Engineering, Electrical and Electronics. In Scopus 37,38 % of the articles were found in open access and in WOS 40,21 %. Conclusions: the metaverse is an emerging area of research, with China and the United States as leaders. The papers published in this area are mainly in English, as the lingua franca of science, characterized by the predominance of original studies and in fields such as computer science and engineering.