Evolution of research in health geographics through the International Journal of Health Geographics (2002–2015)

Sandra Perez (1) , Vincent Laperrière (1) , Marion Borderon (2, 1) , Cindy Padilla (3, 4) , Gilles Maignant (1) , Sébastien Oliveau (1)

1 ESPACE - Études des Structures, des Processus d’Adaptation et des Changements de l’Espace
2 Universität Salzburg
3 REPERES - Recherche en Pharmaco-épidémiologie et Recours aux Soins
4 EHESP - École des Hautes Études en Santé Publique [EHESP]

Health geographics is a fast-developing research area. Subjects broached in scientific literature are most varied, ranging from vectorial diseases to access to healthcare, with a recent revival of themes such as the implication of health in the Smart City, or a predominantly individual-centered approach. Far beyond standard meta-analyses, the present study deliberately adopts the standpoint of questioning space in its foundations, through various authors of the International Journal of Health Geographics, a highly influential journal in that field. The idea is to find space as the common denominator in this specialized literature, as well as its relation to spatial analysis, without for all that trying to tend towards exhaustive approaches. 660 articles have being published in the journal since launch, but 359 articles were selected based on the presence of the word “Space” in either the title, or the abstract or the text over 13 years of the journal’s existence. From that database, a lexical analysis (tag cloud) reveals the perception of space in literature, and shows how approaches are evolving, thus underlining that the scope of health geographics is far from narrowing.

Mots clés: Health geographics; Geographic space; Lexical analysis; Spatial analysis

Domaines: Géographie; Santé publique et épidémiologie

Sandra Perez, Vincent Laperrière, Marion Borderon, Cindy Padilla, Gilles Maignant, et al.. Evolution of research in health geographics through the International Journal of Health Geographics (2002–2015). International Journal of Health Geographics, 2016, 15 (3), pp.1-9. ⟨10.1186/s12942-016-0032-1⟩. ⟨hal-01260193⟩