fraud and anomaly detection research: a bibliometric study

Due to the scientific status and the practical consquences of fraud and anomaly detection research, the aim of this study is to uncover the intellectual and conceptual structure of this research field in audit literature. 430 documents( include article, Conference paper, Review, Book chapter, Book, Review, Note, Letter) related to the period between 1979 and 2022 from the Scopus database were analyzed using two bibliometric analysis methods co-word analysis and social network analysis to discover the intellectual and conceptual structure of the field. The findings of the research show that the main and most dominant topics include "fraud and anomalies", "audit and forensic accounting", "data mining, machine learning and data analytics", "risk assessment" and "internal controls and corporate governance". Also, the article "An empirical analysis of the relation between the board of director composition and financial statement fraud" by Beasley (1996) with 1977 citations, the most cited scientific document, and Peter Gottschalk with 6 articles, the United States with 150 documents, "Managerial Auditing" journal with the publication of 22 articles, and "Universiti Teknologi Mara" from Malaysia, with the publication of 13 documents, were recognized as the most prolific actors in this research field. The important finding of this study is to reveal the remarkable transition to technogical aspects in the field of fraud and anomaly detection, which has attracted the attention of researchers in recent years by using emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and advanced data analytics methods. The findings of the present research, which illustrates the intellectual structure surrounding fraud and anomaly detection research, reveal the orientations of this field. This study can serve as the basis for developing research policies by scientific institutions to help optimize research activities in the field and enable them to play an effective and efficient role in combating fraud.