From access and persistence to institutional responsibility: a bibliometric and science-mapping study of first-generation and first-in-family student research in higher education

Research on students who are the first in their families to enter higher education has expanded across studies of access, persistence, belonging, social class, institutional support, STEM participation, wellbeing and material insecurity. However, the field remains conceptually dispersed, geographically uneven and terminologically variable across higher education systems. This study maps the temporal development, intellectual and conceptual structures, collaboration patterns and thematic evolution of Scopus-indexed research on first-generation and first-in-family students. A Scopus TITLE-ABS-KEY search conducted on 10 April 2026, with no lower year limit, was filtered to English-language articles and reviews at final publication stage. After duplicate resolution, the cleaned corpus comprised 1547 records published between 1989 and 2026; a 393-record title-only corpus was retained as a sensitivity comparison. Differential analysis showed that the expanded search incorporating first-in-family terminology contributed 38 unique records, predominantly involving non-US author affiliations, and broadened coverage of family dynamics, social mobility, belonging, employability and institutional support. The analysis combined performance and collaboration analysis, cited-reference co-citation, bibliographic coupling, keyword co-occurrence, thematic mapping, trend-topic analysis and thematic evolution. Findings show rapid post-2020 expansion, pronounced US concentration and limited international co-authorship. Intellectually, the field is organised around access, persistence, cultural capital, social class, institutional fit, belonging, STEM equity, family context and social support. Thematically, it has shifted towards wellbeing, material insecurity, online learning and institutional responsibility. This study demonstrates that terminology shapes not only corpus size but also which national research traditions and conceptualisations of family educational history become visible.