Biolinguistics: A Scientometric Analysis of Research on (Children's) Molecular Genetics of Speech and Language (Disorders)

• Published in: Children (Basel) 2022-08, Vol.9 (9), p.1300
• Main Authors: Alduais, Ahmed, Almaghlouth, Shrouq, Alfadda, Hind, Qasem, Fawaz
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Animal cognition; biolinguistics; Biology; Childrens health; Chomsky, Noam; Evolution; FOXP2; Grammar; Interdisciplinary aspects; Language; language biological bases; language faculty; language gene; Linguistics; nature–nurture dichotomy; Philosophy; Science; Scientometrics; Teenagers
• ISSN: 2227-9067; 2227-9067
• DOI: 10.3390/children9091300

There are numerous children and adolescents throughout the world who are either diagnosed with speech and language disorders or manifest any of them as a result of another disorder. Meanwhile, since the emergence of language as an innate capability, the question of whether it constitutes a behaviour or an innate ability has been debated for decades. There have been several theories developed that support and demonstrate the biological foundations of human language. Molecular evidence of the biological basis of language came from the FOXP2 gene, also known as the language gene. Taking a closer look at both human language and biology, biolinguistics is at the core of these inquiries-attempting to understand the aetiologies of the genetics of speech and language disorders in children and adolescents. This paper presents empirical evidence based on both scientometrics and bibliometrics. We collected data between 1935 and 2022 from Scopus, WOS, and Lens. A total of 1570 documents were analysed from Scopus, 1440 from the WOS, and 5275 from Lens. Bibliometric analysis was performed using Excel based on generated reports from these three databases. CiteSpace 5.8.R3 and VOSviewer 1.6.18 were used to conduct the scientometric analysis. Eight bibliometric and eight scientometric indicators were used to measure the development of the field of biolinguistics, including but not limited to the production size of knowledge, the most examined topics, and the most frequent concepts and variables. A major finding of our study is identifying the most examined topics in the genetics of speech and language disorders. These included: gestural communication, structural design, cultural evolution, neural network, language tools, human language faculty, evolutionary biology, molecular biology, and theoretical perspective on language evolution.