En analys av forskningsfronten inom medicinsk etik
The purpose of this Masters thesis is to analyze the research front within medical ethics. We wish to identify which research themes that are included in the subject field of medical ethics. The research themes can be identified by a couple of bibliometrical methods and techniques. In our case, it is bibliographic coupling combined with a cluster analysis. The analysis is accomplished by the extracted references from articles in the two journals Bioethics and Journal of medical ethics. The questions we wish to answer are: 1 What research themes can be identified within the field of medical ethics by using bibliographic coupling combined with cluster analysis? 2 Are there differences between the identified research themes regarding the age of the items that are cited in the articles from one of the themes? 3 Which are the most productive authors within the subject field of medical ethics and within each research theme, respectively? 4 Which are the most productive institutions within the subject field of medical ethics and within each research theme, respectively? The analysis formed 24 different research themes. Through the abstracts of articles, identifiers and titles, we determined the contents of the themes. The age of the references placed medical ethics in both the hard and the soft sciences. The analysis of the most productive author and institution within the research themes showed nothing significant. However, A Sommerville was the most productive author in the subject field of medical ethics, along with Royal Children Hosp as the most productive institution.