The State of Research in Circular Design in Portugal and Worldwide: a bibliometric analysis

Abstract

The affirmation of “Circular Design”, as an area of the scientific domain of Design, in association with the Circular Economy, constitutes a relevant reason for research in Design, through interdisciplinary articulation with areas such as Materials Science, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences. For a better perception of the pertinence of the domain, a quantitative and qualitative analysis was carried out, to ascertain the national and international state of research in Circular Design and forecast the future of research in this field. The data were obtained using the Web Of Science and RCAAP - Open Access Scientific Repository of Portugal platform and subdivided into categories, to be able to study the evolution of research from various perspectives, ending in a robust comparative analysis, based on the triangulation of information. For the quantitative analysis, we used data from submitted articles indexed on the Web Of Science (using search by topic, keywords, and abstract) and from articles indexed in RCAAP (through a search by subject, derived from the search engine limitation). A research-based on the subject (RCAAP) was used for qualitative analysis to understand the doctoral theses and MSc dissertations produced in Portugal. From the analysis and treatment of the data, it was concluded that the Netherlands has greater maturity in research, in several of the variables studied. Portugal presents a residual representation in the documents indexed in the Web of Science, contrary to the RCAAP, Sustainable Design presents a growing tendency in the application of the concepts of Circular Design (although indirectly). The growth of research in the area is exponential (according to the Web of Science, 65% of scientific production has been made in the last 5 years), which reveals the opportunity and relevance of research in Design applied to the Circular Economy. At a qualitative level, the investigations carried out in Portugal, although few, demonstrate robustness in the application of concepts, both at a project and methodological level, confirming and demonstrating the opportunity of the fundamental research carried out in this area, with at least two PhD theses and two MSc dissertations degrees focused on Circular Design. The application of an investigation through Design constitutes the Project as a research model validated by peers.