Identifying interdisciplinarity through the disciplinary classification of coauthors of scientific publications

  • Authors:

  • Giovanni Abramo;Ciriaco Andrea D'Angelo;Flavia Di Costa

  • Affiliations:

  • Institute for Systems Analysis and Computer Science-National Research Council of Italy and Laboratory for Studies of Research and Technology Transfer at University of Rome “Tor Vergata ...;Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Impresa, Università degli Studi di Roma “Tor Vergata,”, Via del Politecnico 1, 00133, Roma, Italy and Laboratory for Studies of Research and Te ...;Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Impresa, Università degli Studi di Roma “Tor Vergata,”, Via del Politecnico 1, 00133, Roma, Italy and Laboratory for Studies of Research and Te ...

  • Venue:
  • Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

The growing complexity of challenges involved in scientific progress demands ever more frequent application of competencies and knowledge from different scientific fields. The present work analyzes the degree of collaboration among scientists from different disciplines to identify the most frequent “combinations of knowledge” in research activity. The methodology adopts an innovative bibliometric approach based on the disciplinary affiliation of publication coauthors. The field of observation includes all publications (167,179) indexed in the Science Citation Index Expanded for the years 2004–2008, authored by all scientists in the hard sciences (43,223) at Italian universities (68). The analysis examines 205 research fields grouped in 9 disciplines. Identifying the fields with the highest potential of interdisciplinary collaboration is useful to inform research polices at the national and regional levels, as well as management strategies at the institutional level. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.