Talent Mobility and Economic Performance: A Bibliometric Mapping of Recent Global Research, 2019–2025

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the intellectual structure and thematic evolution of research on talent mobility, human capital, and economic performance. Drawing on 738 journal articles retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection for the period 2019–2025, the study combines bibliometric mapping with interpretive synthesis. Using VOSviewer and CiteSpace, it analyzes publication trends, collaboration networks, keyword co‐occurrence, thematic evolution, co‐citation structures, and bibliographic coupling. The findings indicate that the field is anchored in a stable conceptual core comprising human capital, innovation, performance, productivity, and economic growth. At the same time, emerging themes, including digital transformation, artificial intelligence, remote work, sustainability, and green innovation, are increasingly integrated into this core. Collaboration networks appear more consolidated at the country level than at the institutional and author levels, suggesting internationally active but unevenly coordinated knowledge production. By distinguishing established themes from emerging research fronts, this study advances a research agenda centered on conceptual clarification, measurement consistency, multilevel integration, and cross‐context comparability. The results should be interpreted as bibliometric evidence on the organization and development of the literature rather than as causal evidence on the economic effects of talent mobility.