A decade of grey systems: theory and application – bibliometric overview and future research directions

Purpose: Grey Systems: Theory and Application (GSTA) journal started publication in 2011 and completed a decade in 2021. The purpose of this study is to provide a detailed bibliometric analysis of the articles published in GSTA and their content primary trends and themes. Design/methodology/approach: This study uses the Web of Science (WoS) database to analyze the content of published articles. A range of bibliometric analyses and indicators are applied to analyze the GSTA article content using science mapping tools of the Bibliometrix package in the R environment. Findings: The GSTA publishes around 28 articles each year with citations of this work steadily growing over time. The impact of these publications is measured as total mean citations which increased from 0 to 11. The journal has attracted contributors from around the globe, most often affiliated with China, India and Europe. Thematic evolution of the journal's themes reveals that it has expanded its scope to include topics such as relational analysis, decision making, incidence analysis, and forecasting, hybrid grey-fuzzy or grey-rough modeling, etc. Research limitations/implications: The study is majorly based on GSTA data available on the WoS database. Originality/value: This study provides the first overview of GSTA's publication and citation trends as well as the evolution of its thematic structure. It also suggests future directions that the journal might take to strengthen its position.