Review of Perfectionism Research From 1990 to 2019 Utilizing a Text-Mining Approach

Abstract

Perfectionism is a personality characteristic that has been explored for its implications in mental health; reviews and meta-analyses were conducted to synthesize research findings. This study systemically synthesizes the perfectionism literature using a text-mining approach. Co-word analysis and Dirichlet Multinomial Regression topic modeling were performed on a total of 1,529 perfectionism abstracts published from 1990 to 2019. Analysis revealed that perfectionism research is closely connected with “disorder,” with “symptom” being the most frequently addressed issue. Topic-modeling results found a total of 15 topics represented perfectionism research of the past three decades. Most articles were published in psychology journals, with social and clinical psychology subdisciplines publishing perfectionism articles most frequently. There were overlaps in research topics by journal subdisciplines, while differences were also observed. This study provides a panoramic view of perfectionism literature and highlights frequently and infrequently explored areas that could be considered in future research endeavors.