The use of bibliometric and knowledge elicitation techniques to map a knowledge domain: Software Engineering in the 1990s

Abstract

Parallel mappings of the intellectual and cognitive structure of Software Engineering (SE) were conducted using Author Cocitation Analysis (ACA), PFNet Analysis, and card sorting, a Knowledge Elicitation (KE) method. Cocitation counts for 60 prominent SE authors over the period 1990 -1997 were gathered from SCISEARCH. Forty-six software engineers provided similar data by sorting authors' names into labeled piles. At the 8 cluster level, ACA and KE identified similar author clusters representing key areas of SE research and application, though the KE labels suggested some differences between the way that the authors' works were used and how they were perceived by respondents. In both maps, the clusters were arranged along a horizontal axis moving from "micro" to "macro" level R&D activities (correlation of X axis coordinates = 0.73). The vertical axis of the two maps differed (correlation of Y axis coordinates = -0.08). The Y axis of the ACA map pointed to a continuum of high to low formal content in published work, whereas the Y axis of the KE map was anchored at the bottom by "generalist" authors and at the top by authors identified with a single, highly specific and consistent specialty. The PFNet of the raw ACA counts identified Boehm, Basili, and Booch as central figures in subregions of the network with Boehm being connected directly or through a single intervening author with just over 50% of the author set. The ACA and KE combination provides a richer picture of the knowledge domain and provide useful cross-validation.

Matrix comparison, Part 2: Measuring the resemblance between proximity measures or ordination results by use of the mantel and procrustes statistics

“…Except for Schneider (2004), to our knowledge the Mantel test has never been introduced or applied in library and information science. However, a small number of references are made to the quadratic assignment procedure, without mentioning its origin in the Mantel test (e.g., McCain, Verner, Hislop, Evanco, & Cole, 2005;Nagpaul, 2003;White, 2003;White, Wellman, & Nazer, 2004;Zuccala, 2006). Of the five works, Nagpaul (2003) gives the most extensive presentation of QAP.…”

“…White (2003) briefly refers to the analysis in a footnote, whereas White et al (2004), as well as Zuccala (2006), provide a small description of the statistic. The former study, as well as McCain et al (2005) does apply the QAP statistic in their comparison of matrices. The software used by both studies for the QAP statistic is UCINET by Borgatti, Everett, and Freeman (2002).…”

Business Ethics Research with an Accounting Focus: A Bibliometric Analysis from 1988 to 2007

“…The discourse communities that comprise knowledge domains can be studied using different but complementary methods, with each providing insights into the norms of scholarly communications (McCain et al, 2005). Any discipline tends to build itself around core publications and nourishes its intellectual groundwork through the accumulation of research (Ü sdiken and Pasadeos, 1995, p. 503).…”

Mapping the field of human‐computer interaction (HCI)

“…This congruence between literature structure and citing author perceptions has been demonstrated in a number of fields (McCain et al, 2005). Here, ACA allows us to visualize the connections between well-cited authors within the field of HCI.…”