An Analysis on Research Trends of Distance Education

Abstract

The term “Distance Education” (hereafter DE) is gaining popularity amid new global trends in cross-cultural studies of transnational education. The main objective of this article is to identify the academic research development and future research goals in the Distance Education domain using the Scopus database in the last decade (2012–2022). To this end, a bibliometric analysis was performed examining the distribution of publications, the most influential scientific publication venues, the most productive authors, and regions and concluding with an explanation of the keywords co-occurrence in line with the VOSviewer program. The outcomes revealed that the most frequently examined topics in the field of DE can be detected, which focused on distance learning, online teaching, online education, moocs, ICT, and constitute subgenres of the literature under consideration. All in all, the paper can help scholars understand and decipher current trends, keep up with DE research directions, and finally enable them to conduct their future research more effectively.