Cognitive Flexibility: A Bibliometric Analysis of Research and Insights for Future

Abstract

This study aims to examine the current state of research on Cognitive Flexibility (CF) based on the data available in the Web of Science (WoS). To this end, a bibliometric approach was employed to review the relevant literature on CF utilizing the metadata from the WoS between 1975 and 2023. The study involved an examination of the distribution of the articles by year of publication and average citation status, the most prolific journals publishing on CF, the number of citations of articles on CF, the most highly cited articles on CF, the most prolific authors on the topic, the top countries in which the articles about CF were cited most, the authors who have produced the most articles on CF, their publications, and their countries, and the trend of words associated with CF in the articles. The results reveal that, although the trend of article publication by year has increased in recent years, the highest increase in citations concerning CF articles occurred in 1990 and 1994. The most productive journals included Behavioral Brain Research, Psychiatry Research, Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, and Journal of Neuroscience. Another finding was that the USA is the leading country in CF articles as to CF most frequently cited and it also has the highest production rates. In addition, the most frequently used words in the CF articles were found as flexibility, prefrontal cortex, brain, working-memory, task, cognitive, memory, decision-making, cortex, activation, response-inhibition, executive function, interference, cognitive control, and schizophrenia. It is thus our contention that this study provides a comprehensive review of the existing literature on CF and provides interesting insights into the development of CF that will inform future research.