Watery Research Boundaries: Studying Language, Collaboration, and Content Overlap Between Research on Transboundary Water Resources and Water Security

Abstract:

As the world faces increasing water-related challenges, skills and expertise of researchers from many different disciplines and backgrounds will be required for productive collaboration addressing these complex water challenges. Researchers must be able to communicate with one another and speak the same language in order for this collaboration to be fruitful and for relevant knowledge to be shared. In this work, we study overlap and dissimilarity in collaboration patterns, themes, and language use between research on transboundary water resources and water security. Keyword searches in the Web of Science are used to select relevant journal articles. Using the selected articles, we investigate overlap by constructing co-authorship social networks, publication networks, and examining the content of abstracts using natural language processing techniques. We find that few authors participate in both transboundary water resource and water security research communities, and that authors who have knowledge from both topic areas are uniquely positioned within their social networks to facilitate collaboration on these topics. These authors may facilitate entry points upon which other researchers can realize their research is relevant and knowledge can be further built to address grand water challenges. Our results demonstrate the importance of considering language choice in water research; even slight variations in keyword choice in a search of a particular topic can return different communities of scholars and publications, which could prevent the sharing of knowledge among relevant communities. Common themes found in abstracts such as governance and sustainability suggest that there are opportunities for synergy and knowledge sharing between transboundary water resources and water security research communities. Our study expands current research across both transboundary water resources and water security by showcasing areas of overlap and dissimilarity that may provide potential opportunities for collaboration or utilization of knowledge from a relevant community of researchers.