This study aims to map the evolution of the subject and the studies conducted on innovation and knowledge management (IKM) in higher education, specifically. The study aims to present a systematic summary of the existing literature using bibliometric analysis within the scope of quantitative data to the attention of researchers and to identify study trends and gaps related to the concept. The unit of analysis is the bibliometric data of diferent types of works scanned in the Web of Science database and published between 1997-2024. When we look at the distribution of 942 documents related to IKM in higher education according to their publication years, it is seen that there is the highest concentration in 2018 (294 works), 2019 (77 works), and 2020 (74 works), The names that produced the most works are Umar Farooq Sahibzada, Khawaja Fawad Latif and Francisco J. Garcia-Penalvo; The publication type is mostly journal articles (535) and proceeding papers (380), and the distribution of publications by country is led by publishers from the USA (318), England (251), and Spain (164); works are primarily in English (828), followed by Spanish (83), Portuguese (15) and Chinese (8). When the most frequently used keywords in publications related to IKM in higher education are examined, the expressions knowledge management with 451 occurrences, innovation with 62 occurrences, and knowledge sharing with 54 occurrences are the leading ones.
It has been known since ancient times how valuable knowledge is. The development of societies is
related to how knowledgeable individuals are. For this reason, knowledge management is as important
as knowledge itself. Knowledge management provides the basis for obtaining knowledge, developing
new ideas, and building on this knowledge [
Knowledge management in higher education includes innovation, teaching and learning skills,
academic research, and publishing-related studies [
Knowledge, knowledge creation, and sharing aim to increase the process in which universities
share with other institutions and society and improve the academicians’ experience with concepts
and practices. In addition, it is an important process that allows academicians to gain experience and
knowledge from each other [
This bibliometric study on Innovation and Knowledge Management (IKM) in higher education will make an important contribution to the literature. No bibliometric study uses Innovation and Knowledge Management (IKM) in higher education, so this study is thought to make an important contribution. Thus, it will be seen how much knowledge management contributes to higher education.
In addition, this study provides researchers with access to the most popular keywords about IKM, thus shedding light on new studies that need to be conducted in this field. The distribution of studies according to publication year and citation times not only supports the issue of which journals can be published in the relevant field but also shows the importance of the research by showing which countries have conducted the most studies.
The bibliometric analysis method was employed in this study to provide a comprehensive view of “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education”. The central research question that guided this study is of significant importance: What are the global research trends on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education”? Bibliometric analysis was utilised, a research method that aims to answer this question by presenting global research trends on a particular topic based on publications indexed in databases such as WoS and Scopus3. The study determined the most trending 1OSYM- Tanımlar https://www.osym.gov.tr/TR,1371/tanimlar.html 2Encyclopedia Britannica: Higher Education https://www.britannica.com/topic/higher-education 3Visualizing scientific landscapes https://www.vosviewer.com topics in the literature on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education”, the most cited researchers and their studies, the countries that produce the most publications, and the sources with the most scientific studies.
This study chose the VOSviewer tool for its advanced capabilities in data sets, mapping, visualization, and multi-dimensional analyses.
The Web of Science (WoS) database, known for its comprehensive and reliable studies, was selected to obtain the data set. The WoS database contains a data collection covering diferent disciplines. WoS, together with Clarivate Analytics, includes journals with high-impact factors. It provides a large dataset from many fields, covering important trend studies in higher education and innovation and knowledge management, and provides a reliable citation network with a comprehensive evaluation process and an independent and consistent indexing system. The research was conducted on August 4, 2024, with the keyword combination "Knowledge Management" (Topic) and "Innovation" OR "Technologies" (Topic) and "higher education" OR "HEI" OR "university" OR "post-graduate" OR "graduate" (Topic). Of the 944 documents obtained without any filtering, 942 were included in the study. 2 publications were excluded from the analysis because they were retracted.
This section shows 942 indexed studies on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education” scanned in the WOS database between 1997 and 2024 according to their years, citation times, document types, and indexes. In addition, citation (source, document, author, country) and co-occurrence (all keywords) analyses were performed with the data set, and the results were visualised and interpreted.
The distribution of all-time studies obtained from the database regarding publication year and citation rates is in the figure below.
As seen in Figure 1, the first study on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education” was published in 1997 ( = 1). Studies on this topic mainly started after 2003 ( = 13). In addition, the citation rates of the publications are parallel to the number of publications. Document Types Article Proceeding Paper Review Article Book Chapters Editorial Material Early Access n
When the index types of the publications obtained from the data set are examined, the following are “Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI)” 303, “Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Social Science & Humanities” (CPCI-SSH) 263, “Social Sciences Citation Index” (SSCI) 218, “Conference Proceedings Citation Index – Science” (CPCI-S) 171, “Science Citation Index Expanded” (SCI-EXPANDED) 104, “Book Citation Index – Social Sciences & Humanities” (BKCI-SSH) 11, “Arts & Humanities Citation Index” (A&HCI) 5, and “Book Citation Index – Science” (BKCI-S) 3.
In studies on knowledge management and innovation in higher education, the most preferred keyword by researchers was determined as “knowledge management” (451 times). Other keywords used most by researchers in their studies were “higher education” (451), “innovation” (62) and “knowledge sharing” (54), respectively. The strongest expressions in terms of total link strength were determined as “knowledge management”, “higher education”, and “innovation” as a result of the analyses performed with 2487 observation units that were seen at least five times and had relationships, a total of 11 clusters, 479 links, and 1157 total link strengths were determined.
Figure 2 shows the all-time trends of the most used keywords over time. After 2020, the most popular keywords in the field of knowledge management and innovation in higher education are “Higher Education Institutions”, “Knowledge Management Process”, “organizational performance”, “trust”, and “university-industry collaboration” (Table 3).
The number of citations to a publication indicates its importance [
Table 4 presents the five most cited publications on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education”. As can be seen from the findings, all five of the most cited studies are scientific journal publications. Thus, the five studies presented have left their mark in the field.
The findings, especially the study titled “From knowledge management to organisational performance: Modeling the mediating role of innovation and intellectual capital in higher education”, were read by many researchers in the field and used as a reference in their studies. Citation 153 123 122 69 50
While conducting document and Citation Network analyses to determine the most productive authors, the minimum publication number criterion 5 was chosen. Figure 4 presents the most productive authors working on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education”.
Umar Farooq Sahibzada has written ten documents on “Innovation and knowledge management in higher education,” these publications have received 415 citations. Khawaja Fawad Latif is another researcher who has contributed the most to the field. Latif has six documents with 235 citations. Francisco J. Garcia-Penalvo is in third place with five publications and 304 citations. Irina-Emily Hansen and Ola Jon Mork are among the top five authors, with five publications and 20 citations each.
To create a network map for the citations that documents receive according to their country of origin, a map was made on 60 observation units with relationships between them within the scope of the criterion of at least one published work and 1 citation being received by a country.
Thirteen clusters, 293 links, and 851 total link strengths were identified. The countries with the most citations and documents were determined as Spain (1327 citations, 92 documents), England (1237 citations, 67 documents), and the People’s Republic of China (1105 citations, 96 documents). The ranking in terms of number of works is as follows: USA (318 publications), England (251 publications) and Spain (163 publications). The top three countries in terms of total link strength are the People’s Republic of China (302), Pakistan (261) and England (149), respectively.
To identify journals publishing on “innovation and knowledge management in higher education” and the citation networks of these journals, a network map was created for author citation analysis with the criteria of at least five publications and at least 1 citation. In the study conducted on ten units that were seen to be connected, a total of 4 clusters, ten connections, and a total connection strength of 20 were determined. It was determined that the Journal of Knowledge Management (21 documents), Sustainability (12 documents), and Vine Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems (10 documents) were the journals with the most publications on the subject.
As seen in Figure 6, the most cited journals were the Journal of Knowledge Management, with 742 citations; the Journal of Intellectual Capital, with 277 citations; and Knowledge Management Research and Practice, with 136 citations.
According to the authors’ co-authorship analysis, a network map was created with studies that reveal a solid collaboration and impact network. At least one publication and threshold were made to identify the most connected and collaborating authors.
According to the analysis made among the names with the highest connections, 30 names and 75 connections are seen in six diferent clusters, and the total link strength is calculated as 93. It is seen that the most cited author, Sahibzada Umar Farooq (19 links, 31 total link strength), is connected to at least one author in the other 5 clusters. Another author, Khawaja Fawad Latif (11 links, 20 total link strength), who authored six documents, is found to be connected to three of the other clusters. This structure also shows us which topics they have collaborated on more.
This study aims to examine 944 published studies on innovation and knowledge management in higher education, which were scanned in the Web of Science database. Two documents in the dataset were not included in the study due to article retracts by journal, and analyses were conducted with 942 documents. While scanning the Web of Science, the keywords "Knowledge Management", "Innovation", "Technologies", "higher education", "HEI", "university", "post-graduate", and "graduate" were selected in the Topic field and the search was performed. Although the first study on innovation and knowledge management in higher education was conducted in 1997, it became popular after 2003. It can be said that the developments in information technologies after the 2000s increased the interest in this subject. Most studies on the subject were conducted in 2019. When the most cited research conducted in 2019 was examined, it was determined that this study examined the relationship between knowledge management and the performance of universities in research universities in Pakistan. The study conducted with 217 academic and administrative staf determined that knowledge management facilitators significantly impact knowledge management processes. The results revealed that knowledge management facilitators in higher education afect institutional performance.
According to the results obtained from the analyses conducted to determine the trending topics related to innovation and knowledge management in higher education, it was determined that they are “knowledge management process”, “organizational performance”, “trust”, “university-industry collaboration”, “artificial intelligence” and “sustainability”. ”.The study conducted by Latif and her colleagues in the "knowledge management process" field in 2021 has been researched that can be given as an example of trending topics. Latif et al. (2021) aimed to determine the impact of knowledge management enablers on knowledge management processes and project success. The study revealed that entrepreneurial orientation and knowledge-oriented leadership significantly impact knowledge management processes and project success. Another study, among the trending topics conducted by Rehman and Iqbal in 2020, addressed innovation and organizational performance in higher education. Focusing on the impact of higher education institutions on organizational performance, the study concluded that knowledge-oriented leadership has a positive impact on organizational performance.
To increase organizational performance, a good knowledge management process needs to be implemented; therefore, research is being conducted on the subject. In addition, the mission of universities today is to establish good cooperation with the industry, to ensure that learners learn more efectively and to train human resources in line with the needs of the industry. In parallel with this, research has begun on the subject. In addition, all educators and researchers consider the importance of sustainable education and technologies today. To provide sustainable education, information and communication technologies should be used efectively, and the information management process should be designed most eficiently. Another trending topic is artificial intelligence, as in all other areas. Artificial intelligence has started to be used in all areas, and how to best utilize artificial intelligence in information management to benefit from the positive opportunities of artificial intelligence is among the topics that need to be investigated. When the most cited studies are examined, it is concluded that all of the top five studies are journal articles. This may suggest that publishing in peer-reviewed journals and journals indexed in WoS indexes increases the visibility of the research and contributes more to science. In the current study, it was determined that the most cited author was Umar Farooq Sahibzada. The researcher’s studies have been chosen to focus on knowledge management processes for organizational performance, knowledge management facilitators, and the impact of knowledge management processes on organizational performance.
Regarding the distribution of publications by country, it was revealed that the publishers originated from the USA, England, and Spain; documents were published primarily in English and Spanish. Another result is that higher education studies on innovation and knowledge management are mostly published in the Journal of Knowledge Management, Sustainability, and Vine Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems. Researchers can benefit from these journals to follow the literature on the subject and publish their studies.
In the future, researchers conducting studies on innovation and knowledge management in higher education can plan their research by considering the results obtained from this study, which can help them contribute more to the literature. In particular, researchers can easily find which studies and journals should be read first on the subject from this study.
One of the study’s limitations is that the analyses conducted on publications obtained from keywords in the WoS database collection did not include internationally respected databases such as Scopus, IEEE, and Ebsco and sources that have yet to be published online. However, future studies on this subject are recommended to expand the research scope by including other important databases. According to the results of this study, systematic analysis can be performed to obtain more detailed information in future studies.