Do science maps from open access literature capture the overall topic structure of an academic field? A study on sustainable food research

This study compares the science map of sustainable food research constructed using only open access (OA) publications to that using all papers. Citation network analysis revealed 17 and 15 clusters in the OA and full datasets, respectively, with good correspondence between the two at the cluster level. However, at the subcluster level, several specific topics present in the full network were absent from the OA representation. The results suggest that while OA science maps capture broad research trends, they may miss granular subtopics. This has implications for researchers relying solely on OA data for scientific mapping.