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Circling around interdisciplinarity

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  • Peter Besselaar

    (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam)

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss Loet Leydesdorff’s extensive contributions to the understanding and measurement of interdisciplinarity. Apart from that, we summarize a series of issues in the debate about interdisciplinarity and suggest how to move forward. Leaving out the innovative work on visualization and animation, we distinguish three different approaches to measuring interdisciplinarity: (i) mapping interdisciplinary fields based on similarities between referencing patterns of sets of journals; (ii) betweenness centrality as indicator of interdisciplinarity of individual journals, and (iii) diversity of references of individual journals (and papers) as indicator of interdisciplinarity of those individual journals. After various tests the conclusion is that both the second and third approach are not useful as indicators for interdisciplinarity. Betweenness centrality measures multidisciplinarity at best, and diversity of referencing measures diversity of knowledge inputs, but not interdisciplinarity as a knowledge output. The problems with both approaches basically relate to the problem of how to define, measure and map the dynamics of research fields, which bring us back to the first approach mentioned above. We argue why it is worthwhile to develop that further in order to better understand the nature and role of interdisciplinary research.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Besselaar, 2025. "Circling around interdisciplinarity," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 130(6), pages 3293-3311, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:scient:v:130:y:2025:i:6:d:10.1007_s11192-025-05346-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11192-025-05346-7
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Loet Leydesdorff & Caroline S. Wagner & Lutz Bornmann, 2018. "Betweenness and diversity in journal citation networks as measures of interdisciplinarity—A tribute to Eugene Garfield," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 114(2), pages 567-592, February.
    2. Hessels, Laurens K. & van Lente, Harro, 2008. "Re-thinking new knowledge production: A literature review and a research agenda," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 740-760, May.
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    4. Wilfred Dolfsma & Loet Leydesdorff, 2010. "The citation field of evolutionary economics," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 20(5), pages 645-664, October.
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    6. Andy Stirling, 2007. "A General Framework for Analysing Diversity in Science, Technology and Society," SPRU Working Paper Series 156, SPRU - Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex Business School.
    7. Loet Leydesdorff & Ismael Rafols & Chaomei Chen, 2013. "Interactive overlays of journals and the measurement of interdisciplinarity on the basis of aggregated journal–journal citations," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 64(12), pages 2573-2586, December.
    8. Ismael Rafols & Alan L. Porter & Loet Leydesdorff, 2010. "Science overlay maps: A new tool for research policy and library management," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 61(9), pages 1871-1887, September.
    9. Ismael Rafols & Martin Meyer, 2010. "Diversity and network coherence as indicators of interdisciplinarity: case studies in bionanoscience," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 82(2), pages 263-287, February.
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    11. Wagner, Caroline S. & Roessner, J. David & Bobb, Kamau & Klein, Julie Thompson & Boyack, Kevin W. & Keyton, Joann & Rafols, Ismael & Börner, Katy, 2011. "Approaches to understanding and measuring interdisciplinary scientific research (IDR): A review of the literature," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 5(1), pages 14-26.
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    14. Alan L. Porter & Alex S. Cohen & J. David Roessner & Marty Perreault, 2007. "Measuring researcher interdisciplinarity," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 72(1), pages 117-147, July.
    15. Loet Leydesdorff, 2018. "Diversity and interdisciplinarity: how can one distinguish and recombine disparity, variety, and balance?," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 116(3), pages 2113-2121, September.
    16. Loet Leydesdorff & Robert L. Goldstone, 2014. "Interdisciplinarity at the journal and specialty level: The changing knowledge bases of the journal cognitive science," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 65(1), pages 164-177, January.
    17. Loet Leydesdorff, 2008. "Caveats for the use of citation indicators in research and journal evaluations," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 59(2), pages 278-287, January.
    18. Loet Leydesdorff & Carole Probst, 2009. "The delineation of an interdisciplinary specialty in terms of a journal set: The case of communication studies," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 60(8), pages 1709-1718, August.
    19. Loet Leydesdorff & Thomas Schank, 2008. "Dynamic animations of journal maps: Indicators of structural changes and interdisciplinary developments," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 59(11), pages 1810-1818, September.
    20. Rafael Núñez & Michael Allen & Richard Gao & Carson Miller Rigoli & Josephine Relaford-Doyle & Arturs Semenuks, 2019. "What happened to cognitive science?," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 3(8), pages 782-791, August.
    21. Leydesdorff, Loet & Wagner, Caroline S. & Bornmann, Lutz, 2019. "Interdisciplinarity as diversity in citation patterns among journals: Rao-Stirling diversity, relative variety, and the Gini coefficient," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 255-269.
    22. Alan L. Porter & Ismael Rafols, 2009. "Is science becoming more interdisciplinary? Measuring and mapping six research fields over time," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 81(3), pages 719-745, December.
    23. Loet Leydesdorff, 2007. "Betweenness centrality as an indicator of the interdisciplinarity of scientific journals," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 58(9), pages 1303-1319, July.
    24. Iina Hellsten & Loet Leydesdorff, 2016. "The construction of interdisciplinarity: The development of the knowledge base and programmatic focus of the journal Climatic Change, 1977–2013," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 67(9), pages 2181-2193, September.
    25. Loet Leydesdorff, 2007. "Visualization of the citation impact environments of scientific journals: An online mapping exercise," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 58(1), pages 25-38, January.
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