Thirty years of International Transactions in Operational Research: past, present, and future direction

Abstract

AbstractThe journal “International Transactions in Operational Research” (ITOR) marks its 30th anniversary this year. This study undertakes the first bibliometrics analysis of ITOR covering the past 30 years (1994–2023). Utilizing metadata from 1835 articles published in the journal, this article evaluates ITOR’s intellectual, conceptual, and social structures. The study highlights several exciting outcomes: First, the literature publication trend shows sustained growth and increased articles’ publication and citation impacts. Second, the analysis of the intellectual structure using co‐citation analysis and text analytics identified a solid collaborative relationship with core sources in operations research and management science and applications. Third, the conceptual evaluation using the co‐occurrence of keywords as the unit of analysis identifies the thematic trends of publications in ITOR. Finally, the social structures, which focused on country collaborations and literature contributions dynamics and impacts, offer insights into future directions to maintaining or strategizing a global focus for the Journal.