Analyzing Research Trends on Happiness Education through Network Text Analysis

Objectives The purpose of this study is to analyze the trends about happiness education to form basic data for the development of related research and explore directions for the improvement of future research. Methods A total of 248 papers were selected by searching for two keywords, ‘happiness’ and ‘education’, from the titles of papers uploaded on RISS, including 224 KCI-listed papers, 24 KCI candidate papers. After selecting 5 keywords per paper, a total of 1,240 main keywords were derived, and their correlations were analyzed through network text analysis. Results The main results are as follows: First, the number of research works increased quantitatively around 2012. Second, in the analysis of academic journals, research was conducted mainly in journals targeting preschoolers, and research was also active in journals related to ethics and morality. Third, in the analysis of keyword frequencies and word cloud, many keywords related to educational programs and early childhood education were found. Fourth, in the network text analysis, the influence of keywords related to early childhood education was high, and policy-related keywords were not visible. Conclusions The main conclusions and suggestions of this study are as follows: First, the increase in the number of publications by year was significantly influenced by external factors such as the boom of positive psychology after the introduction of related works in Korea and changes in government policies in line with OECD's humanitarian turn. Continuous interest in related research is needed regardless of external factors' influences. Second, research focused on early childhood education should be expanded to secondary education, higher education, and lifelong education. Third, research should move beyond short-term application of educational programs and satisfaction surveys to research on developing related educational curricula or policy models from a long-term perspective. Fourth, it is needed that research should be conducted on establishing the relationship between character education and happiness education. Fifth, more diverse research is needed on examples of happiness education practices in foreign countries.