Visual citation navigation of open education resources using Litmaps

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this study is to visualize the key literature on the topic “Open Educational Resources” using the research discovery tool “Litmaps”. Design/methodology/approach Litmaps visual citation navigation, the ultimate science discovery platform, is used for the present study. It provides an interface for discovering scientific literature, explores the research landscape and discovers articles that are highly connected to maps. Litmaps provides quick-start options to import articles from reference manager, keyword search, ORCID ID, DOI or using a seed article. In this paper, “keyword search” and research strategy “Open Educational Resources” or “OER” are put to use. Findings The findings of the study revealed that Litmaps gives citations between articles over time visually. The map generated is dynamic as it is adjustable for making the map according to the researcher’s needs. Research limitations/implications Litmaps helps researchers in doing the literature review in a very brief and systematic way. It is helpful in finding the related or relevant studies through the seed paper/keyword search. Originality/value The study makes a useful contribution to the literature on this topic as one can independently find research topics and also compare topic overlapping. The study provides insights that help researchers in building citation maps and see connections between articles over time. The originality of the present paper lies in highlighting the importance of the research discovery tool Litmaps for the researchers as so far, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no research has been taken place on using it.