Research Method Usage across Academic Ages in Library and Information Science: An Empirical Study (1990-2023)

2026-06-19

AI Summary

This study investigates how academic age influences methodological choices among scholars in Library and Information Science (LIS). Drawing on a corpus of 26,677 articles published between 1990 and 2023 in 14 leading journals, the authors employ author disambiguation techniques to compute academic age and introduce, for the first time, the CogFT model to automatically classify research methods, complemented by Top2Vec for topic modeling. The analysis reveals a sustained decline in the use of theoretical approaches alongside significant increases in experimental and bibliometric methods. Methodological diversity peaks among mid-career researchers and is lowest among late-career scholars. These findings illuminate evolving patterns in research methodology within LIS and offer empirical guidance for early-career researchers in selecting appropriate methods.

Abstract

Academic age critically shapes career development, influencing research behavior, output volume, and methodological choices. Analyzing method variation across academic ages offers a new theoretical lens on scholarly evolution and provides early-career researchers with practical guidance for method selection. A corpus of 26,677 articles published 1990-2023 in 14 authoritative Library and Information Science journals was compiled. The CogFT model automatically classified the research methods embedded in these articles, and Top2Vec generated the topic model. This process resulted in a comprehensive dataset linking research methods with topics. Author-name disambiguation enabled calculation of each scholar's academic age. Popularity and Shannon diversity indices for methods, together with topic diversity, were compared across academic age groups. Results reveal dynamic methodological trends: the share of theoretical approaches declined gradually, whereas experimental and bibliometric methods gained ground. Method popularity differs significantly among cohorts. Mid-career scholars exhibit the highest method diversity; late-career scholars the lowest.

Problem

• academic age
• research methods
• methodological trends
• Library and Information Science
• scholarly evolution

Innovation

• academic age
• research method classification
• CogFT model
• Top2Vec
• methodological diversity