Bibliometric articles in business and management: Factors affecting production and scholarly impact

Abstract

Based on different theoretical and publishing approaches, this study reveals that the publication of bibliometric articles in business and management follows a logistic diffusion pattern. Fist, the analysis of citation concentration −using the Gini index, concludes that a minority of articles capture most scholarly interest, there is a moderate concentration of articles in some outlets, and a large and diverse group of authors, forming a long tail distribution. Second, a set of hypotheses are tested by alternative regression models (OLS, semi-logarithmic, and negative binomial models). Results support the importance of specific characteristics such as the synthesis of previous contributions, the methodological sophistication, or the cosmopolitanism of the collaboration of the authors. In addition, there is an inverse effect of bibliometric expansibility on the impact of each article. The authors built a database from a content analysis of 835 bibliometric articles in WoS (1981–2022). The results raise several implications and recommendations.