Web of Science’ta İndekslenen Türkiye Adresli İlahiyat Dergilerinin Araştırma Performansı [Research Performance of Turkish Theological Journals Indexed in Web of Science]

This study presents a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of ten Turkish theology journals indexed in the “Religion” category in Web of Science (WoS). The main objective of the study is to examine the research performance of these journals in the international academic platform, to evaluate their visibility and impact, and to offer some solutions. As in other fields, bibliometric analyses has become increasingly important in the field of theology in recent years. Such analyses help to monitor and measure publication quality as well as academic performance. However, there is no comprehensive bibliometric analysis on theological journals in Türkiye. In this context, this study aims to determine the international visibility and impact of WoS-indexed theological journals in Türkiye. The study is expected to contribute to similar bibliometric analyses in the field of theology and to fill the gaps in the literature. All data used in the study were obtained from the WoS database. The raw data extracted from the database were checked and made ready for analysis after the necessary data cleaning. Bibliometrix (R software package) and VOSviewer, which are professional applications in this field, were used to perform bibliometric analysis of these data. The data were evaluated based on various metrics, such as the number and type of published articles, number of citations, and author collaboration. In addition, details such as the annual growth rates of the journals and the most cited articles were also analyzed. The key findings of the study are as follows: As a result of the profiles and comparative analyses of the journals, it was found that Türkiye is one of the leading countries with ten journals, ranking sixth among the countries with journals indexed in the WoS “Religion” category. The inclusion of new theological journals in the WoS index in recent years shows that Türkiye is well positioned in international academic journalism in the field of theology, with a growing influence through collective experience. The fact that all the journals are open access (through the DergiPark system) enables the articles in these journals to reach a wide readership in the international academic community. The national and international collaborative networks of authors publishing in these journals, influential articles and the development processes of the journals were analyzed in detail. Accordingly, names such as Ali Ayten, Ayfer Gedikli and Seyfettin Erdoğan stand out among the most influential writers. Sakarya Univ., Cumhuriyet Univ., and Erciyes Univ. are the prominent institutions in terms of the total number of publications. At the same time, Sakarya Univ., Marmara Univ., and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Univ. are the institutions with the highest number of cooperation networks. While Azerbaijan, the USA and Kyrgyzstan stand out as countries with international cooperation in publishing, the article emphasizes the need to increase the rate of publications with international cooperation and the importance of journals being included in higher indexes. In addition, the lack of studies on gender distribution analysis was highlighted and the importance of this issue for journals in the future was mentioned. The study mentions the total publication-citation ratio and the cumulative number of publications of the journals by years and includes the most influential articles. Again, the language of publication in these journals was examined and it was found that articles written in English were slightly more effective and had a higher citation potential. The study also carried out keyword analyses of these articles. Issues such as which topics are covered more, which concepts are used more frequently, and how often they are used are discussed. All these findings show how the theological journals in Türkiye have gained a place in the academic community worldwide. As a result, the international academic performance of Turkish theological journals has been com