A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts
Communication research is a broad and interdisciplinary field that is strongly influenced by several other disciplines, including behavioral and human sciences. This study uses structural topic modeling (STM) to analyze and trace the intellectual structure of the field over the past century based on...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Elsevier
2025-12-01
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| Series: | International Journal of Information Management Data Insights |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667096825000461 |
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| author | Mohamed M. Mostafa Mohammad Alhur Ahmed M. Moustafa |
| author_facet | Mohamed M. Mostafa Mohammad Alhur Ahmed M. Moustafa |
| author_sort | Mohamed M. Mostafa |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Communication research is a broad and interdisciplinary field that is strongly influenced by several other disciplines, including behavioral and human sciences. This study uses structural topic modeling (STM) to analyze and trace the intellectual structure of the field over the past century based on a twenty-nine communication journals’ corpus encompassing 24,983 abstracts, totaling more than two million words. Results show a wide range of important research themes in the field, including communication theory, media analysis, health communication, rhetorical theory, interpersonal interactions, small group communications, political debate, and speech education. Diachronically, our results reveal that some topics, such as “speech education” and “political debate” have waned over time, whereas other topics, such as “narrative/discourse analysis” and “global policy change” have gained recently more attention from communication scholars. These findings underscore not only the intellectual breadth and historical evolution of communication research but also highlight key paradigm shifts in the field. The study demonstrates how computational text analysis can inform meta-theoretical understanding and strategic planning within academic disciplines. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-4a1b036d8e3e4dd583b7a8ceed201323 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2667-0968 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-12-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | International Journal of Information Management Data Insights |
| spelling | doaj-art-4a1b036d8e3e4dd583b7a8ceed2013232025-08-20T05:08:03ZengElsevierInternational Journal of Information Management Data Insights2667-09682025-12-015210036410.1016/j.jjimei.2025.100364A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstractsMohamed M. Mostafa0Mohammad Alhur1Ahmed M. Moustafa2Gulf University for Science and Technology, Mishref, Kuwait; Corresponding author.Business Intelligence Department, Faculty of Business, Al-Zaytoonah University of Jordan, Amman, JordanUniversity of Essex, 36 Queens Rd, Southend-on-Sea SS1 1BF, Essex, UKCommunication research is a broad and interdisciplinary field that is strongly influenced by several other disciplines, including behavioral and human sciences. This study uses structural topic modeling (STM) to analyze and trace the intellectual structure of the field over the past century based on a twenty-nine communication journals’ corpus encompassing 24,983 abstracts, totaling more than two million words. Results show a wide range of important research themes in the field, including communication theory, media analysis, health communication, rhetorical theory, interpersonal interactions, small group communications, political debate, and speech education. Diachronically, our results reveal that some topics, such as “speech education” and “political debate” have waned over time, whereas other topics, such as “narrative/discourse analysis” and “global policy change” have gained recently more attention from communication scholars. These findings underscore not only the intellectual breadth and historical evolution of communication research but also highlight key paradigm shifts in the field. The study demonstrates how computational text analysis can inform meta-theoretical understanding and strategic planning within academic disciplines.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667096825000461Communication researchTopic modelingSTMText miningMachine learning |
| spellingShingle | Mohamed M. Mostafa Mohammad Alhur Ahmed M. Moustafa A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts International Journal of Information Management Data Insights Communication research Topic modeling STM Text mining Machine learning |
| title | A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts |
| title_full | A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts |
| title_fullStr | A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts |
| title_full_unstemmed | A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts |
| title_short | A structural topic modeling of communication research: insights from over a century of journals' abstracts |
| title_sort | structural topic modeling of communication research insights from over a century of journals abstracts |
| topic | Communication research Topic modeling STM Text mining Machine learning |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667096825000461 |
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