Trends and Patterns in the Key Attributes of the 24 Top Business Journals: 2001–2021

Abstract

We document trends and patterns in the key attributes of the 24 top journals during 2001–2021 using data from the Web of Science. These trends include growth by disciplines and journals represented among selected journals in terms of growth in publications, relative publication share of disciplines, number of unique authors, attributes of prolific authors, and the extent of interdisciplinary contributions. We compare and contrast our findings with prior studies and offer a few conjectures on similarities and differences in the findings. We hope that our descriptive findings will spur further research on the production function of science and help identify the determinants of research productivity in top journals.