A Look at Educational Research in Latin America from its Papers

This research seeks to provide a general overview of educational research in Latin America based on the study of articles published in Latin American impact journals and written by authors of the Region. Specifically, the 1,086 articles on empirical research in education written by Latin American authors and published in journals published in Latin America and indexed in JCR (ISI Web of Science), Scopus or SciELO, during the years 2014, 2015 and 2016 are reviewed. Four elements are reviewed: the authorship of the articles, the subject of study, the level of education addressed and the research methodology used. The results indicate that three countries (Brazil, Mexico and Chile) concentrate 75% of the papers, 59.1% of the authors are women and 53% of the papers are signed by three or more people. Among the most studied topics include Learning and school performance, Teachers and Teaching strategies, curriculum and teaching practices. Higher Education is clearly the most studied, with 43.1% of the papers. And, finally, there is no priority methodological approach, with practically half of qualitative articles, the other half quantitative. With all this information, it is possible to conclude some elements that translate into the need for greater support for research, a rethinking of topics and levels of study and a boost to collaborative research.