Tourism and statistics - Bibliometric study 1998-2002

The use of statistics in any scientific discipline can be considered a key element in evaluating its degree of maturity and demonstrates the generation of nonspeculative knowledge. The aim of this study is to carry out a bibliometric analysis of the rise of statistical methods in tourism research. To accomplish this, a group of 12 tourism journals published within a 5-year period (1998-2002) were chosen and 1,790 articles were reviewed by means of a taxonomy with 24 statistical categories. The main results show the percentage of articles that apply statistical techniques as compared to those that do not, and a ranking of the techniques most often used and their distribution according to journal.