Scientific publications and COVID-19 “research pivots” during the pandemic: An initial bibliometric analysis

  1. Philip Shapira

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Abstract

An examination is presented of scientific research publication trends during the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic in 2020. After reviewing the timing of the emergence of the pandemic in 2020 and the growth of governmental responses, available secondary sources are used to highlight impacts of COVID-19 on scientific research. A bibliometric analysis is then undertaken to analyze developments in COVID-19 related scientific publications through to October of 2020 by broad trends, fields, countries, and organizations. Two publication data sources are used: PubMed and the Web of Science.

While there has been a massive absolute increase in PubMed and Web of Science papers directly focused on COVID-19 topics, especially in medical, biological science, and public health fields, this is still a relatively small proportion of publication outputs across all fields of science. Using Web of Science publication data, the paper examines the extent to which researchers across all fields of science have pivoted their research outputs to focus on topics related to COVID-19. A COVID-19 research pivot is defined as the extent to which the proportion of output in a particular research field has shifted to a focus on COVID-19 topics in 2020 (to date) compared with 2019. Significant variations are found by specific fields (identified by Web of Science Subject Categories). In a top quintile of fields, not only in medical specialties, biomedical sciences, and public health but also in subjects in social sciences and arts and humanities, there are relatively high to medium research pivots. In lower quintiles, including other subjects in science, social science, and arts and humanities, low to zero COVID-19 research pivoting is identified.

In a new Appendix to the paper, an updated analysis is provided through to mid-April 2022 .

Citation

Shapira, P. “Scientific publications and COVID-19 “research pivots” during the pandemic: An initial bibliometric analysis,” bioRxiv 2020.12.06.413682; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.06.413682

Version Notes

Version 1: Original paper, completed on December 6, 2020; posted at bioRxiv on December 7, 2020.

Version 2: Minor grammar items corrected.

Version 3: Updated bibliometric analysis through to mid-April 2022 added on April 29, 2022, as new Appendix 2.

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  1. Version published to 10.1101/2020.12.06.413682v2 on bioRxiv
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.12.06.413682: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board Statementnot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No funding statement was detected.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

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  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.12.06.413682v1 on bioRxiv