A bibliometric analysis of the literature on non-financial information reporting: Review of the research and network visualization

Abstract

This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of articles on the topic of non-financial information (NFI) reporting. The exponential growth over the last decade (90% of the articles were published in the last 10 years) indicates the relevance of the topic, but little is known about the structure and extent of research in this academic field. The purpose of this article is to provide a structured and up-to-date picture of the state of the art on the topic. We analyse the most relevant articles, authors, journals, countries and organizations. The analysis includes 3113 articles, collected from the Web of Science (WoS) Core Collection from 1970 —when the first two articles on the topic were published— to 2019. The software VOSviewer was used to graphically display the data. We identified and described a total of six research lines in the literature: determinants, essence, reports, integrated reporting, environment, and consequences of reporting. These research lines are analysed and gaps for future research are identified. We also comment on the implications of the strong collaboration networks found within Arab, European and Asian countries. This study is of great interest because it provides researchers with a map of the field, improving their understanding of the interconnection between aspects within the topic. It also enables researchers to better position their studies and to identify new streams of research.