Subject analysis on the field of E-learning research

With the digital development and the global trend of information technology applying teaching and learning in recent years, every country around the world regards the promotion of e-learning as a very important policy of the country. They lay special emphasis on the development of the subject research in e-learning. The present study adopts the search strategy of generalized definition of e-learning and collects 2,125 SSCI periodical literature in total on e-learning field from the years of 2000 till 2009. They are analyzed with automatic context exploration tool CATAR to proceed to dissection. Then they are respectively analyzed with co-occurrence words and bibliographic coupling to proceed to the research subject analysis. Thus it can integrate the frames of research subjects of e-learning field. Not only can the results of the present study help the researchers to look into their own field specialty, to master the development situation of research subject dimensions and to make reference to the scholars and experts to determine their research subjects, but it can also help understand the research development status of international e-learning field.