Prompting Literature Review: The Impact of Transformer Models and ChatGPT on Prompt Engineering and AI Research Publications

Artificial intelligence (AI) has significantly impacted our daily lives, particularly through advancements in conversational interfaces enabled by large language models. This state-of-the-art literature review examines the evolution of the prompt phenomenon, focusing on key developments such as the Transformer model and ChatGPT. By analyzing the growth in related research publications from the Scopus database across three periods—pre-Transformer (1967–2016), post-Transformer (2017–2021), and post-ChatGPT (2022-2024)—this study highlights the exponential growth of prompt engineering as a critical area of AI research. The findings reveal how prompt engineering has evolved from a basic computational concept into a recognized engineering discipline, with implications for both technical and social sciences. The review also proposes future research directions, including the exploration of non-linear prompting and prompt-oriented behavior engineering, to further enhance human-AI interactions and optimize generative AI systems.