Is Spirituality seen in a new light post-Covid-19? - A bibliometric Analysis

Abstract

The present study conducts a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of the topic to examine the state of spirituality research in light of the COVID-19 epidemic.  The topic of trending research and  peer-reviewed publications in spirituality and COVID-19 were the main focus of the study. The authors retrieved 1263 peer-reviewed papers published in journals and books since 2020, from the Scopus database. As intended, the thorough analysis of the trends, scientific output, and thematic focus of spirituality and Covid-19 has been done using the Bibliometric technique. The pandemic was announced in 2019 and the analysis submits that the work on Spirituality in the light of the pandemic kickstarted in 2020. For the researchers in the field, the most elite publications for the research papers are the Journal of Religion and Health”, “Religions”, “Frontiers in Psychology”, “International Journal of Environmental Research” and “Public Health and Journal of Pastoral Care and Counseling”. The author, Ardnt Bussing with 13 papers in the field to his credit. Amongst the nations, the most research papers on Spirituality and COVID-19 have been published in the United States of America. The paper also highlights the institutions where the research in the field has been promoted and published. The word map has prominently revealed the most frequented words from the papers for the analysis viz., Covid-19 (632), Spirituality (193), Pandemic (121), Covid-19 and Pandemic (92), and Mental health.

The implications for the researchers in this field are the study of the basic themes like COVID-19 pandemic, mental health, and resilience are crucial topics but, not adequately researched. The emerging themes like palliative care, grief, and death are topics for potential future research. The present study provides the analysis of the research in the field and through that providing the directions of future research as indicated by the bibliometric analysis. These results are intended to help researchers—especially those who are just beginning to study spirituality in the light of COVID-19—choose which aspects of the field to concentrate on, what approaches have been most successful in the past, where to publish their work, which dimensions to investigate, and identify collaborations with authors and institutions.