2022 IEEE International Conference on Consumer Electronics

(ICCE)

5G and User Experience: A Bibliometric Approach

Dahye Jeong, Jinyoung Han, Eunil Park∗ , Eun Been Choi Sangheon Pack
Department of Applied Artificial Intelligence School of Electrical Engineering
Sungkyunkwan University Korea University
Seoul, Republic of Korea Seoul, Republic of Korea
{gwg03391, jinyounghan, eunilpark, ebeen94}@skku.edu shpack@korea.ac.kr

Abstract—This paper aims to conduct a bibliometric analysis of current study is organized as follows: Section 2 presents the
research at the intersection of 5G and user experience in the last study methodology. Section 3 examines the key results and
five years. The main purpose of the current study is to provide Section 4 makes a concluding remark based on the results
the current status and trends of this intersection research in
2022 IEEE International Conference on Consumer Electronics (ICCE) | 978-1-6654-4154-4/22/$31.00 ©2022 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/ICCE53296.2022.9730286

one of the academic research databases, that is, Web of Science. from Section 3.
From the results of our study of 116 collected articles, published II. S TUDY M ETHODOLOGY
from 2017 to 2021, we found a continuous growth in this area
of intersection research. We highlight several leading affiliations, A. Data Gathering
publication venues and supporting agencies and confirm that To collect the intersection articles of 5G and UX, we used
there are notable interests and improvements in this area.
Index Terms—5G, user experience, bibliometric analysis, Web Web of Science [5], a database for bibliometric studies. To
of Science retrieve our target data, we set the publication period to five
years since 2017 (i.e,. Jan. 2017 to Aug. 2021) [6], [7]. Table I
I. I NTRODUCTION shows the search query in this study.
4G, the fourth generation of wireless and mobile communi- TABLE I: Search query and criteria.
cation technologies, has been mainly employed in presenting
mobile data services for our society, while the fifth generation Category Description
Query (TS=(”user experience” OR ”UX”)) AND (TS=(5G))
(5G) has rapidly suffused into various aspect of our society.
Selection Language: English, Index: SSCI, SCIE, Year: 2017,
With this diffusion of 5G, a number of services have newly 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021
emerged and have been provided to the commercial markets
in several advanced countries (e.g. South Korea and United We collected the authors, sources, supporting agencies, af-
States) [1], [2]. filiations, nations and research areas. We used four publication
Considering the fastest-growing effects of 5G and related types: articles, early access, proceeding papers and reviews.
emerging services, research on users’ perspectives toward 5G
and the services have become one of the hottest topics to B. Data Analytics
successfully diffuse 5G infrastructure and to improve indus- After collecting the dataset from Web of Science, we
trial competitiveness. Compared to a number of bibliometric examined the trends of intersection research of 5G and UX
approaches to technical and engineering research of 5G [3], with consideration of articles, areas, article venues, countries
only few studies have focused on the intersection between 5G and supporting agencies.
and user experience (UX).
III. R ESULTS OF B IBLIOMETRIC A NALYSIS
The general definition of bibliometric analysis is “an ap-
proach for the statistical and quantitative analysis of research We collected 116 publications from January 2017 to August
publications that can quantify the literature growth of specific 2021. First, we examined the trends of publications in 5G
subjects and the impact of individual research results” [4]. and UX. As presented in Table II, considering that only
Bibliometric studies can provide the trend of specific research eight months in 2021 were considered in this analysis, the
topics with consideration of research outcomes. Also, they can annual number of publications in the area of 5G and UX has
present an overview of a specific research field, grouped by consistently increased from 2017 (15 (12.9%)) to 2020 (41
regions, researchers, research areas, sources and supporting (35.3%)). This means that the academic interests in UX and
agencies. 5G have consistently developed.
Thus, this study attempts to conduct a bibliometric analysis Second, we examined the research areas of publications.
to provide an overall trend of recent intersection research of Table III shows a summary of the research categories of 5G
5G and UX in the last five years. The study can lead to a and UX articles. Because UX and 5G are generally considered
better understanding of the emerging research topics on users’ as the main topics in computer science (76, 65.5%) and
perspectives toward 5G and its services. The reminder of the telecommunications (84, 72.4%), these categories rank high
in the number of articles published. Moreover, the general
∗ Corresponding author. engineering category ranks fairly high (81, 69.8%).

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 TABLE II: The publication number in 5G and UX. TABLE VI: Top supporting programs for the research of 5G
Year Number of articles
and UX
2017 15 (12.9%) Programs (or supporting agencies) Number of articles
2018 16 (13.8%) National Natural Science Foundation Of China 36 (31.0%)
2019 20 (17.2%) Fundamental Research Funds for the Central 9 (7.8%)
2020 41 (35.3%) Universities
2021 24 (20.7%; as of Aug. 2021) European Commission 5 (4.3%)
National Key R&D Program of China 5 (4.3%)
TABLE III: Top five research categories in the intersection of Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitive- 3 (2.6%)
ness
5G and UX. Multiple categorization is allowed.
Categories Number of articles TABLE VII: Top nations for the research of 5G and UX
Telecommunications 84 (72.4%)
Engineering 81 (69.8%) Countries Number of articles
Computer Science 76 (65.5%) China 59 (50.9%)
Chemistry 7 (6.0%) Spain 14 (12.1%)
Physics 5 (4.3%) Finland 12 (10.3%)
United States 12 (10.3%)
South Korea 9 (7.8%)

Third, we examined the top venues for articles of 5G and

UX in Table IV. The most popular venue for 5G and UX and practical topics, evidenced by the increasing number of
was IEEE Access (29, 25.0%), one of the biggest open-access publications in Web of Science. The majority of leading
journals. The second popular venue was IEEE (IEEE Com- venues were organized by telecommunication and computer
munications Magazine, 6 (5.2%), another journal provided by science (e.g. IEEE Access, IEEE Communications Magazine),
IEEE. while Samsung, South Korean company, and Huawei Tech-
TABLE IV: Top venues for the intersection of 5G and UX nologies, Chinese company were considered to be the top
affiliations in this area. Moreover, China was examined to be
Venues Number of articles
IEEE Access 29 (25.0%)
the leading nation in the intersection research of 5G and UX.
IEEE Communications Magazine 6 (5.2%) Thus, we suggest future researchers to start their collaborative
Sensors 4 (3.4%) work and research with the leading affiliations presented in
Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing 4 (3.4%)
Others 73 (62.9%)
this study.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Fourth, we present the top research affiliations in Table V. This research was supported by National Research Foun-
Samsung (7, 6.03%), one of the global companies in telecom- dation (NRF) of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Gov-
munications, was the top productive affiliation, followed by ernment (MSIT) (No. 2021R1A4A3022102), and by the
two Chinese affiliations (Huawei Technologies, 6, 5.17%; MSIT(Ministry of Science, ICT), Korea, under the High-
Chinese Academy of Sciences, 5, 4.31%). Potential Individuals Global Training Program (IITP-2021-0-
02104) supervised by the IITP(Institute for Information &
TABLE V: Top affiliations for the research of 5G and UX
Communications Technology Planning & Evaluation).
Affiliations Number of articles
Samsung Electronics 7 (6.03%) R EFERENCES
Huawei Technologies 6 (5.17%)
Chinese Academy of Sciences 5 (4.31%) [1] J. Kim, J. Lee, T. Kim, and S. Pack, “Deep reinforcement learning based
Aalto University 4 (3.45%) cloud-native network function placement in private 5g networks,” in 2020
Beijing University of Posts Telecommunications 4 (3.45%) IEEE Globecom Workshops (GC Wkshps. IEEE, 2020, pp. 1–6.
Tampere University 4 (3.45%) [2] D. K. Kim, H. Lee, S.-C. Lee, and S. Lee, “5g commercialization and
University of Electronic Science Technology of China 4 (3.45%) trials in korea,” Communications of the ACM, vol. 63, no. 4, pp. 82–85,
University of Oulu 4 (3.45%) 2020.
Xidian University 4 (3.45%) [3] M. N. I. Farooqui, J. Arshad, and M. M. Khan, “A bibliometric approach
to quantitatively assess current research trends in 5g security,” Library Hi
Fifth, we examined both the top supporting programs and Tech, 2021.
[4] Y. Gao, L. Ge, S. Shi, Y. Sun, M. Liu, B. Wang, Y. Shang, J. Wu,
research nations (Tables VI and VII). Three research programs and J. Tian, “Global trends and future prospects of e-waste research:
in China and two research agencies in Europe support 58 arti- a bibliometric analysis,” Environmental Science and Pollution Research,
cles in research area of 5G and UX (50.0%). Correspondingly, vol. 26, no. 17, pp. 17 809–17 820, 2019.
[5] Clarivate, “Web of Science,” https://www.webofscience.com/, 2021.
China (59, 50.9%) was the most productive nation for research [6] J. Kim, D. Lee, and E. Park, “Machine learning for mental health in
in 5G and UX, followed by Spain (14, 12.1%), Finland (12, social media: Bibliometric study,” Journal of Medical Internet Research,
10.3%), United States (12, 10.3%) and South Korea (9, 7.8%). vol. 23, no. 3, p. e24870, 2021.
[7] W. Choi, J. Kim, S. Lee, and E. Park, “Smart home and internet of
things: A bibliometric study,” Journal of Cleaner Production, vol. 301,
IV. D ISCUSSION AND C ONCLUSION p. 126908, 2021.
Our study of bibliometric analysis showed that the intersec-
tion of 5G and UX has become one of the emerging academic

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