Research Trends and Emerging Themes of Data Repository for Research Data Management Services in Higher Education: a Bibliometric Analysis

Research data management (RDM) has become an important service for research support in higher education. Data repository is a prevailing and emerging tool in implementing RDM services. This study performed a bibliometric analysis on literature related to data repository for research data management services, using the bibliometric visualization tool of VOS Viewer to reveal the research trends and emerging themes of this area. The bibliometric data was identified and exported from the Web of Science Core Collection database, comprising 199 journal articles published from 2013 to 2023. This study covers two parts of analysis: firstly, by analyzing the keyword clusters and keyword frequency, leading research trends of data repository for RDM services were identified with the analysis of each cluster. Secondly, the yearly distribution of keywords with the evolution over time was analyzed to determine the emerging themes. The results identified four research trends of data repository for RDM services: 1) library as a key role of the data repository services provider; 2) Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reusability (FAIR) principles; 3) open data & data sharing; and 4) disciplinary data repository; and two emerging themes: 1) data repository services in the medical discipline; and 2) the publicity and visibility of data repository by the registry. Based on the “FAIR” which is the core principle of this field, this study summarized the framework for the reasons and requirements of data repository for research data management services.