Analysis of scientific colaboration networks between special education and speech therapy

Abstract

This article analyses the scientific collaboration networks between Special Education and Speech Therapy. The corpus of the study consisted of 267 articles published by 44 researchers who conducted postgraduate studies in Special at the Federal University of São Carlos, between at years 1981 to 2009, whose dissertations and theses characterize the interface between these two areas of knowledge. The data source was Lattes Curriculum. The methodology adopted was the social network analysis (SNA) that allowed
constructing scientific collaboration networks through authoring and co-authoring relationships among actors participating in these knowledge areas. The softwares Ucinet and Netdraw were used to map networks and produce graphs to view the collaborations between actors. The results showed the existence of small clusters with few actors who hold the domain for publication; the formation of collaborative networks between advisor and student publications in co-authoring and the collaboration with researchers in the country and abroad. The study also showed that the analysis of scientific collaboration networks in the field of Special Education and Speech Therapy contribute to the development of future research on this interface.