Global research trends of literature in sugar-sweetened beverages: 2000–2016

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) are commonly used. The objective of this study was to analyze the quantity and quality of published literature on SSBs and present the results in a bibliometric format. METHODOLOGY: Scopus database was used to retrieve documents from 2000 to 2015. Annual growth of publications, collaborations, geographic distribution, visualization and mapping of collaboration, author analysis, and top-cited articles will be presented and discussed. RESULTS: The total number of worldwide publications on SSBs was 3345, published in 27 subject areas. More than half (58.30%) of the SSB publications were within the area of medicine. The number of publications gradually increased until 2013 followed by a steady state. The median of number of citations was 3 (0–14) per document. The annual growth rate of publications on SSBs dropped from 15.22 in 2001 to 1.00 in 2016. The total number of authors was 13,813, with a mean of 3.72 ± 0.72 authors per document. Most documents (2942, 87.95%) were multi-authored publications. The USA was the most productive country (1062; 31.75%) followed by the United Kingdom (234; 7%) and Brazil (171, 5.11%). Harvard University was the leading institution with 112 publications. The most commonly preferred journal for publishing was “Public Health Nutrition” with 81 publications. Half of the top ten preferred journals were in the field of nutrition. CONCLUSION: Bibliometric analysis of literature on SSBs is one method to enrich literature and encourage health policymakers and nutrition specialists to take the case of SSBs one step further to limit the consumption of SSBs.