A contemporary science map through the lens of IEEE and ACM periodicals

TL;DR

This study qualitatively analyzes recent trends in IEEE and ACM periodicals, highlighting a shift towards open access, ACM's focus on AI, and thematic overlaps within each association's publications.

Contribution

It provides a qualitative overview of contemporary science trends in IEEE and ACM publications, emphasizing open access, AI focus, and thematic overlaps.

Findings

Growing preference for open access publications

ACM's increasing focus on AI-related periodicals

Significant thematic overlap within each association's periodicals

Abstract

ACM and IEEE are the two premier associations on computing and electrical/electronics engineering which publish and organize the great majority of periodicals and conferences, respectively, serving these disciplines. Science is a constantly evolving process, and these publication fora are expected to follow the trends. In this article, we focus on the periodicals published by the two associations and seek to detect and/or confirm any contemporary science trends as these are reflected to the periodical titles established recently. Our study is rather qualitative than quantitative, aiming at revealing patterns immediately comprehensible and validatable by the reader. Among the most notable patterns, we see a growing preference of both associations for the open access mode of publication; we also observe ACM's orientation toward AI-focused periodicals, and most importantly, a significant theme overlap among periodicals of the same association and this is valid for both ACM and IEEE.