Operations and Supply Chain Management Commons^™

The Small World Of Material Handling Research, Parag J. Siddique, Kevin Gue, Md Salahuddin Ayuby

15th IMHRC Proceedings (Savannah, Georgia. USA – 2018)

Using data from 88 journals over an 8 year period, we investigate the relationships among researchers in material handling. We apply social network analysis to measure many attributes of the network, including papers published each year, papers published per author, number of collaborators per author, strength of collaboration between authors, and how influential an author is in the network. We observe that collaboration patterns in material handling follow a scale-free structure in the presence of some hub-like researchers. According to social network theory, these hub researchers facilitate rapid dissemination of knowledge in the network. We conclude that the scientific community …