Mapping Research on Industrial Safety and Occupational Health in the Automotive Industry: A Global Bibliometric Review
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.70577/asce.v4i4.551Keywords:
Occupational health and safety, Automotive industry, Bibliometrics, Scientific production, Working conditions.Abstract
This bibliometric study aims to map the scientific production related to Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) in the automotive industry based on documents indexed in Scopus. Indicators of production, impact, productivity, collaboration, themes, and conceptual structure were analyzed to identify patterns, gaps, and trends in the development of the field. The results show sustained growth in the literature over the last two decades, although concentrated in a limited number of authors, countries, and collaboration clusters. Academic impact is unevenly distributed, with a small number of documents accumulating most citations. At the thematic level, three main axes were identified: biomedical, population-focused, and industrial-ergonomic. However, themes directly related to the automotive industry such as ergonomics, manufacturing, and sector-specific risks show low density and centrality, indicating limited development and a lack of integration with consolidated research nuclei in occupational health. The conceptual structure confirms this fragmentation, displaying subfields that are weakly interconnected. Overall, the findings reveal that OHS research in the automotive industry is an emerging field, with important advances but also significant gaps that justify the need to expand scientific production, consolidate international networks, and develop deeper studies, including systematic reviews and interdisciplinary approaches. This mapping provides a solid foundation for guiding future lines of research.
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