Analysis of Research Trends in Water Resource Management Using Network Analysis

Abstract

This study was conducted to investigate the research trends in water resource management using authors' keywords of papers in this area. For this purpose, networks of keywords were constructed through the analysis of social networks and the degree centrality was used as a measure for analyzing the water resource management areas in which research is being conducted most actively. Based on this analysis, the research trends in water resource management during the 1990s, 2000s, and after 2010 were investigated. As a result, the most active research areas in water resource management were found to be integrated water resource management system, water policies, and the development of programs for optimizing water resources. As a result of the analysis by period, the central subjects of research that emerged as new trends were found to be the acquisition of water resources such as ground water development during the 1990s, water resource management during the 2000s, and water resource management measures and government policies to cope with climate change after 2010. The significance of the present study is that the research trends were examined around the correlations among keywords by using social network analysis, rather than analyzing research trends simply by using the frequencies of papers and citations in water resource-related papers.