Knowledge structure of personality and individual differences: A 43 year's retrospective of the journal using bibliometric analysis

Abstract

Personality and Individual Differences (PAID) publishes groundbreaking theoretical and empirical research on a broad spectrum of psychology-related topics since its inception in 1980. The journal is highly valued among academics, researchers, and professionals due to its distinctive contributions to the field of psychology. A state of the art bibliometric techniques were applied to deeply assess PAID's impact over the past four decades. The journal's progression is examined from a historical perspective, analyzing 12,702 peer-reviewed articles and 369,735 citations between 1980 and 2022. Data from the Web of Science database was used to assess the most-cited articles, productive and influential authors, key contributing countries, and frequently used keywords. A bibliographic coupling analysis further identified nine distinct research themes based on shared bibliographies, such as, measurement and psychological assessment, learning and cognitive abilities, psychological factors and coping strategies, personality traits and dimensions, cognitive abilities and social influence, dark personality traits and individual behavior, behavioral and emotional regulation models, emotional intelligence and human behavior, and perfectionism and personality traits. These distinct clusters represent key areas of focus within PAID over the last four decades, having attracted significant attention from the academic community and are poised to shape the future trajectories of PAID.