Evolution of General Education Research in Korean Higher Education: A Network Analysis of Keywords Post-Funding Initiatives

Objectives This study attempted to analyze the trends of research related to university liberal arts education from the 2010 ACE project to the present, when the university financial support project required a full-scale change in the curriculum, and to suggest future directions for liberal arts education based on this. Methods A total of 403 papers on university liberal arts education published from 2010 to February 2025 were analyzed using NetMiner 4.1. First, the number of papers by year was identified, and second, the organic relationship between the keywords was confirmed by converting them to one-mode using the collected thesis information keywords, and visualization was conducted using Word Cloud. Third, the connection centrality, mediation centrality, and proximity centrality of the extracted keywords were identified, and after each network analysis, a spring map and a circular map were presented. Finally, a community analysis was conducted to understand the cohesion of the data collected in this study. Results First, the research on liberal arts education has continued to increase since the ACE project in 2010, and in particular, research on liberal arts education innovation has been conducted more actively since the university innovation support project was implemented. Second, as a result of analyzing keywords related to university liberal arts education, 'competence' was found to have the highest frequency, keywords such as 'convergence', 'satisfaction', 'recognition', 'humanities', 'writing', and 'culture' also showed high frequency of occurrence in keyword correlation analysis. Third, as a result of the network cohesion analysis, the keywords were divided into four groups: 'digital education and convergence thinking', 'experience-based learning and effectiveness analysis', 'emotional and social competency and art-based education', and 'global competency and learner-centered education', showing that university liberal arts education is gradually being subdivided and specialized. Conclusions Since the ACE project in 2010, liberal arts education research has continued to increase, and in particular, research on liberal arts education innovation has been conducted more actively since the university innovation support project was implemented. As a result of keyword analysis, it was confirmed that liberal arts education research includes a variety of topics such as competency-based education, convergence learning, global competency, and emotional and social competency enhancement. This suggests that changes in the university curriculum are closely linked to the financial support project of the Ministry of Education, and that liberal arts education is recognized as a key factor in responding to changing social needs while supplementing major education. In the future, research is needed considering the relationship with the major curriculum, and it is expected that university education can develop in a direction suitable for modern society through continuous discussion.