Knowledge Structure of Posttraumatic Growth Research: A Network Analysis

초록

Posttraumatic growth literature has been rapidly expanding in multiple academic disciplines. Purpose of this study is to examine the knowledge structure of posttraumatic growth utilizing a network analysis. Papers published between 1996 and 2018 were searched on the Web of Science, focusing on terms related to posttraumatic growth. One thousand six-hundred and fifty-nine keywords were published 6,343 times in 1,780 papers; thus, a total of 322 keywords (5,195 appearances) were selected for the final analysis. The network analysis and network visualization tool used were NodeXL and PFnet, respectively. The keywords which appeared the most frequently were “Posttraumatic growth,” followed by “Posttraumatic Stress Disease,” “Cancer,” and “Trauma.” A total of 322 nodes have been reduced to 175 nodes and divided into a total of five groups. The five groups were “Posttraumatic Growth in Cancer, Chronic/Serious Illness, and Disability,” “Posttraumatic Growth-related Psychological Variables and Psychotherapy,” “Posttraumatic Growth in the Context of Death,” “Cognitive Mechanisms of Posttraumatic Growth,” and “Vicarious Posttraumatic Growth.” This study provides a systematic overview on the knowledge structure of posttraumatic growth by quantitatively network analysis.

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