Sharing economy : a bibliometric review of the literature

In this thesis, I provided a bibliometric review of the sharing economy literature in order to identify the theoretical bases and main themes implicit within the sharing economy. One hundred frothy articles which have been published in sharing economy field have been selected. Three bibliometric methods have been applied on the articles; co-citation analysis, bibliographical coupling and co-word analysis. The results of the analyses revealed that sharing economy research has three broad domains of scientific study as its theoretical background. 1) Value co-creation, 2) Behavioral psychology regarding motives and barrier for user engagement and trust and 3) theories of practice and sociology of consumption. The analyses also showed three main research themes within the current literature of sharing economy; 1) Social and regulatory challenges of sharing economy 2) Consumer-oriented studies about consumer motives and intentions 3) Sharing economy business models. At the end according to the review, some recommendations for future studies have been presented.

Questa tesi propone un’analisi bibliometrica della letteratura scientifica sulla Sharing Economy con l’obiettivo di identificare i fondamenti teorici e i temi principali affrontati. 140 articoli pubblicati in journal accademici sono stati selezionati. Tre analisi bibliometriche sono state fatte sul sample: co-citation analysis, biographical coupling e co-word analysis. I risultati delle analisi mostrano come la ricerca sulla sharing economy si basi su tre fondamenti teorici: 1) value co-creation, 2) psicologia comportamentale legata alle motivazione e alle barriere per il coinvolgimento degli utenti e per la fiducia verso il sistema e 3) teorie sulle pratiche e sulla sociologia del consumo. Le analisi mostrano anche tre temi principali affrontati da questa letteratura: 1) le sfide dal punto di vista sociale e regolatori, 2) gli studi sulle motivazioni e le intenzioni dei consumatori e 3) i business model della sharing economy. Infine vengono proposte delle linee guida per studi futuri.