A Bibliometric Analysis on the Research Trends of Gamification in Higher Education: 2010-2020

Abstract

Research on gamifi cation shows that it has positive impacts on learning, performance , motivation, and engagement. To have a big picture on gamifi cation research in higher education, a combination of bibliometric and thematic analysis was conducted. For this study, a total of 432 documents from 2010 to 2020 which have been indexed in Web of Science database are investigated. Additionally, the researchers analyzed a group of 10 articles to review how much contribution they had to the body of research. General tendencies in the way gamifi cation has been changing or developing in academic literature were scrutinized from the perspective of a variety of diff erent factors including the time the works were published; the areas of the research fi eld; and the authors, organizations, countries, and co-authorship publishing the most number of works in the issue. Th e possible future applications and results for educational organizations and academicians, top academic decision-makers, and educa-tionists are discussed.