Unpacking the research methods used by Indian LIS researchers: A longitudinal study

The study aims to examine the research methodologies adopted by Indian Library and Information Science (LIS) researchers. The present study analysed 559 research articles published in national and international journals between 2000 and 2020 within a 5-year interval to identify the research methods adopted by Indian LIS researchers. Quantitative content analysis was used to identify the research methods adopted by Indian LIS researchers. The findings of the study revealed that citation analysis/bibliometrics (33.6%), questionnaires (29.3%) and case studies (12.0%) were the dominant research methods. The year-wise trends data also revealed that the citation analysis/bibliometrics method was consistently the most frequently adopted research method during the study period. Furthermore, it is revealed that national and international journals exhibit significant differences in the types of research methods adopted by Indian LIS researchers ( χ 2 = 22.134, p < 0.05). The findings of the present study will be immensely relevant to LIS researchers.