A Multi-Technique Bibliometric Analysis of The Field of Distributed Work: Where it All Began, Where is it Now and Where is it Going

Abstract

This review focuses on the growing field of distrubuted work, made even more relevant in light of the current pandemic. Many different definitions, labels, and conceptualizations of distributed work exist, resulting in a fragmented field, threatened by a proliferation of concepts. Prior reviews either tackle a limited scope of phenomena or review approaches, are narrative/subjective/not systematic, lacking objectivity, comprehensiveness and reproducibility, or recency. Our study attempts to advance the current overview of the field by providing a comprehensive review of the development and current state of the field. We do so by applying a combination of three bibliometric techniques—co-citation analysis, co-word analysis, and bibliographic coupling—applied against the backdrop of the invisible colleges framework. This produces an integrative and holistic framework of the field of distributed work, portraying its historic development and theoretical background, conceptual space and nomological net, guiding future research on this and connected topics.