The Research Map Regarding the Importance of Communication in Athlete Success: Bibliometric Analysis

Communication in sports requires special attention, especially for athletes who are in direct contact with coaches, spectators, etc.

Based on an examination of 49 years of papers related to communication with athletes published in diverse scientific documents, we examine developments in the field in this article using bibliometric analysis. This is a bibliometric review of publications related to communication between coaches and or among athletes to identify authors, countries, affiliations, the most relevant sources, and the evolution of scientific results, thematic maps, and keywords.

On February 8, 2023, the metadata search in the Scopus database using the search terms "athlete” and "communication" resulted in a total of 519 documents.

The author's keyword "communication" was the one that appeared in the most, with a total of 45 occurrences, followed by "athlete" with 44 and "sport" with 33 occurrences. The keyword "injury" was the newest keyword that came up ten times in 2017-2021 and 2022. On the thematic map, "crisis communication" is a growing topic that should receive researchers’ attention.

Researchers and scientists interested in this topic might also take advantage of several publications, authors, and trending keywords as references for further research. As a result, sports academics must work on research on the topic of communication in athletes and apply what they learn in training and competition practices.