A content analysis of original research articles on public health published in an international journal: The case study of Thailand

Abstract

© 2019, Indian Journal of Public Health Research and Development. All rights reserved. This study aimed at exploring the most common content of Masters and Doctoral level research articles published by an internationally recognized public health sciences journal of a Thai academic institute. The objective was to assess the current status of public health research. A content analysis of 265 abstracts from 2009 to 2015 was classified into content, objective, research field, methodology, study population, statistics used and study area. The study revealed that 66% of submissions were Master’s level contributors and 34% from Doctoral level. The top study content at Master’s level was ‘health behaviors’, while ‘environmental health’ was popular at. The study objective at both levels was to identify cause and reasoning. Study populations were mostly conducted amongst adults. The majority of studies at Master’s level used quantitative research methods while Doctoral level students used inferential statistics. The majority of articles were published in the ASEAN Citation Index database whilst a few were published in Scopus and the Web of Science databases. Topics relating to “alternative medicines’ and ‘environmental health’ were mostly published in Scopus. Further strategies regarding encouraging students to publish in Scopus and Web of Science and emphasis on encouraging in-depth health behavior and community health research conducted in aging should be addressed since these can provide preventive services and develop a viable public health field for the future.