Scientific Outputs on Cyberchondria: scientometric, Altmetric and Researchers’ Sciencitifc Collaboration Network Analysis

Cyberchondria can be considered one of the emerging challenges in the age of the Internet. The aim of this study was to to investigate the scientific productivity and analyze the collaboration network of authors in the cyberchondria field in the Web of Science (WoS).

To conduct this research, scientometric, altmetrics and social network analysis indicators were utilized. All scientific output related to the topic of cyberchondria indexed in the Web of Science until the collection of research data in June 2020 constituted the study materials. The Web of Science and Altmetric Explorer were used for data gathering. Moreover, UCINet and VOSviewer software was used for the visualization and analysis of scientific collaboration networks.

The majority of the papers (80%) were published in 2015-2020. 42.2% of total production was in 2019-2020. Journal of Anxiety Disorder has published the largest number of papers (10%). Most scientific productions in this field are related to the subject areas of psychiatry and psychology. Fifty-one papers out of the 79 papers with unique DOIs published in this field were mentioned at least once in social media platforms. 81.1% of the papers were multiple-authored.

Although the number of papers in the cyberchondria field in the Web of Science was low, its trend is increasing. Investigating the collaboration network of researchers showed that they tended to participate in groups.