Mapping the evolution of entrepreneurship as a field of research (1990-2013): A scientometric analysis.

Yanto Chandra,Sergi Lozano

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0190228

Abstract

This article applies scientometric techniques to study the evolution of the field of entrepreneurship between 1990 and 2013. Using a combination of topic mapping, author and journal co-citation analyses, and overlay visualization of new and hot topics in the field, this article makes important contribution to the entrepreneurship research by identifying 46 topics in the 24-year history of entrepreneurship research and demonstrates how they appear, disappear, reappear and stabilize over time. It also identifies five topics that are persistent across the 24-year study period––institutions and institutional entrepreneurship, innovation and technology management, policy and development, entrepreneurial process and opportunity, and new ventures––which I labeled as The Pentagon of Entrepreneurship. Overall, the analyses revealed patterns of convergence and divergence and the diversity of topics, specialization, and interdisciplinary engagement in entrepreneurship research, thus offering the latest insights on the state of the art of the field.

Highlights

Entrepreneurship is a highly dynamic and fast growing scholarly field of research with a long intellectual tradition
I began the analysis by performing topic mapping using Van Eck’s Java-based VOSviewer techniques [18, 37, 43, 45] using the four periods of bibliometric data, and I sought to give a label to all topic clusters that emerged in each interval according to the terms and phrases that were prominent in each period and depict the number of terms in each topic cluster and calculated their share out of all terms in each period
The findings suggested that entrepreneurship research continues to draw from and are published in a diverse number of other disciplines and journals, including psychology, sociology, economics, strategy, international business, and policy and development studies, confirming some of the observations of Gregoire and colleagues that the field has diverging patterns [12]

Summary

Introduction

Entrepreneurship is a highly dynamic and fast growing scholarly field of research with a long intellectual tradition. After a rather sluggish growth for decades, entrepreneurship research gained some momentum with an emphasis on the person-centric approach, which attributes psychological traits and people’s characteristics as predictors of entrepreneurship [5, 6]. As it evolved, the field experienced a behavioral turn, with growing emphasis on what entrepreneurs really do; why and how they recognize, evaluate, and exploit opportunities [7]. Other scholars concluded that the field was highly permeable, relied heavily on major management journals, and lacked boundaries and new theories [9]

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Discussion

Conclusion