Evolution of the public understanding of science based on a bibliometric analysis of two major journals

Abstract

This paper is part of the reflection initiated in 2016 following the20th anniversary of the Public Understanding of Science Journal,analyzing both the thematic evolution of the journal itself andbroader aspects of the evolution of thefield. Here, we aim toanalyze developments in PUS based on all the papers publishedin thefield’s two major journals: Science Communication andPublic Understanding of Science. We propose to study thefieldbased on the epistemic relations established between textsresulting from the references they include. Thus, although theaforementioned journals constitute our source of information, byincorporating in the analysis the references of all the papers inthese journals–which include books and other journals–wesignificantly expand the scope and build the epistemic links thatare established by the texts analyzed in a very specific way.