Research landscape and trends of internet addiction disorder: A comprehensive bibliometric analysis of publications in the past 20 years

Abstract

Background: Internet addiction disorder (IAD) has emerged as a significant public health concern in the digital age, with implications for mental health and social wellbeing. Despite growing recognition, IAD remains a relatively nascent field within academic research.

Methods: We conducted a comprehensive bibliometric analysis to explore the global research landscape and trends of IAD. Our methodology involved analyzing author analysis, journal analysis, keywords, and citations in publications related to IAD from 2004 to 2024.

Results: We identified "internet addiction," "internet gaming disorder," and "adolescent" as the most frequently occurring keywords, highlighting significant research areas within IAD. The analysis revealed that terms like "social media addiction," "problematic smartphone use," and "COVID-19" have gained prominence in recent years, reflecting the evolving nature of digital technology's impact on mental health. Clustering analysis illustrated the interdisciplinary nature of IAD research, integrating insights from psychology, sociology, network science, and psychiatry. Citation analysis identified highly influential papers, such as Kuss and Griffiths' review on social networking addiction and Brand et al.'s I-PACE model for internet-use disorders.

Conclusions: Our findings highlighted the importance of continuing interdisciplinary research to address the multifaceted challenges of IAD. Future research should focus on the intersections of digital behaviors with mental health, personality traits, and social dynamics to develop comprehensive strategies for prevention and intervention.

Keywords: Internet addiction disorder; bibliometric analysis; internet gaming disorder; mental health; problematic smartphone use; social media addiction.

Figure 1.

Trends in the published articles and citation counts of internet addiction disorder research from 2004 to 2024. The annual publication quantity and citation frequency of research on internet addiction disorder from 2004 to 2024.

Figure 2.

Network visualization of journal publication volume, collaboration, and citation relationships in the field of internet addiction disorder from 2004 to 2024. The graph depicts the co-citation relationships among research journals, with node size indicating the frequency of co-occurrence and connections indicating co-citation relationships. Node size reflects the significance and influence of journals in the network.

Figure 3.

Visualization analysis of the collaboration network of journals in VOSviewer. Journals in different clusters are distinguished by nodes of different colors, with node size representing their frequency of occurrence.

Figure 4.

Keywords co-occurrence network mapping and correlation analysis of internet addiction disorder research from 2004 to 2024. The visualization analysis depicts the duration of keyword popularity over time for the top 30 keywords ranked by frequency from 2011 to 2024. In this visualization, line length represents the duration of popularity, while dot size indicates the frequency of occurrence, organized chronologically.

Figure 5.

The dendrogram of keywords categorizes them into three main clusters based on their similarities.

Figure 6.

The keyword map illustrates the connections between studied keywords in internet addiction disorder research. Nodes, categorized by color, represent different clusters of keywords. Node size indicates the frequency of co-occurrence, while connections between nodes depict relationships among keywords.

Figure 7.

The diagram illustrates the 25 primary keywords characterized by pronounced bursts of citations, denoted by red spikes on the timeline. These bursts signify sudden surges in citation counts, signaling pivotal moments of emerging crucial questions or solutions within the field.

Figure 8.

Highly cited references citation and co-citation analysis of internet addiction disorder from 2004 to 2024. Visualization overlays the main research directions of highly cited literature, with darker colors indicating more citations to literature in that direction.

Figure 9.

References are grouped based on their likeness, where smaller numbers denote larger clusters, with #0 denoting the most substantial cluster. Node size reflects the frequency of co-citations, while the connections between nodes depict co-citation associations.

Figure 10.

The diagram illustrates the 25 primary references characterized by pronounced bursts of citations, denoted by red spikes on the timeline. These spikes signify sudden surges in citation counts, signaling pivotal moments of emerging crucial questions or solutions within the field.