Trembling Identity

A Bibliometric Analysis of the Development of STS Community in Japan

Abstract

　 After the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, there is growing momentum for looking for the way how to apply STS knowledge to the society among STS scholars in Japan. Accordingly, they began to attempt to delineate the trajectory of the development of STS in Japan and explore the ideal future of it. However, most of the previous studies are qualitative investigations relied on the memories and experiences of the members of their community and there seems to be a lack of quantitative-based discussions. In this article, the author conducted text mining with the conference proceedings of the Japanese Society for Science and Technology Studies （JSSTS） to identify the chronological shift of the trend of research of STS and compared with the preceding studies with a qualitative approach. The results indicated the existence of trends in STS studies that several previous studies had asserted, such as the rise of science communication and its propaganda shift. The author concluded that the quantitative approach could contribute to the discussions about the identities and future selves of STSers in Japan.