DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.13998979
title: Data and figures for "Evolving interdisciplinary contributions to global societal challenges: A 50-year overview"

description: This package accompanies the paper titled "Evolving interdisciplinary contributions to global societal challenges: A 50-year overview", available on arXiv. The datasets and figures included are derived from data obtained through the OpenAlex API. For further details, please refer to the original paper.

Suppl_data_1.csv
Domains are labelled by 𝛼 = 1, ..., 4, where 1: Life Sciences, 2: Social Sciences, 3: Physical Sciences, and 4: Health Sciences.

 




pyear
Year of publication


nwork
Number of publications, indexed in OpenAlex


nwork𝛼
Number of publications in domain 𝛼, indexed in OpenAlex


nIDR


Number of publications with ’multi-/inter-/trans-disciplinar*’ in Title or Abstract, indexed in OpenAlex



nIDR𝛼
Number of publications in domain 𝛼 with ’multi-/inter-/trans-disciplinar*’ in Title or Abstract, indexed in OpenAlex


%nIDR 
Ratio of nIDR to nwork (in %) 


%nIDR𝛼 
Ratio of nIDR𝛼 to nwork𝛼 (in %)




 

Suppl_data_2.csv
Disciplines (the level-0 concepts defined in OpenAlex) are labelled by k = 1, ..., 19, where 1: Political Science, 2: Philosophy, 3: Economics, 4: Business, 5: Psychology, 6: Mathematics, 7: Medicine, 8: Biology, 9: Computer Science, 10: Geology, 11: Chemistry, 12: Art, 13: Sociology, 14: Engineering, 15: Geography, 16: History, 17: Materials Science, 18: Physics, and 19: Environmental Science. 

 









idwork
Work identifier starting with ‘W’, as defined in OpenAlex


pyear
Year of publication


citation
Number of citations, as of April 2024, indexed in OpenAlex


discipk
Score of affinity to each of the level-0 concepts defined in OpenAlex (k = 1, ..., 19)




SDGm



Score of affinity to each of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (m = 1, ..., 17)








 
description: Addressing global societal challenges necessitates insights and expertise that transcend the boundaries of individual disciplines. In recent decades, interdisciplinary collaboration has been recognised as a vital driver of innovation and effective problem-solving, with the potential to profoundly influence policy and practice worldwide. However, quantitative evidence remains limited regarding how cross-disciplinary efforts contribute to societal challenges, as well as the evolving roles and relevance of specific disciplines in addressing these issues. To fill this gap, this study examines the long-term evolution of interdisciplinary contributions to the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), drawing on extensive bibliometric data from OpenAlex. By analysing publication and citation trends across 19 research fields from 1970 to 2022, we reveal how the relative presence of different disciplines in addressing particular SDGs has shifted over time. Our results also provide unique evidence of the increasing interconnection between fields since the 2000s, coinciding with the United Nations' initiative to tackle global societal challenges through interdisciplinary efforts. These insights will benefit policymakers and practitioners as they reflect on past progress and plan for future action, particularly with the SDG target deadline approaching in the next five years.