Analysis on Research Trend of Recidivism of Sex Crimes using Keyword Network Analysis

The purpose of this study is to suggest the direction of future studies on the prevention of sexual recidivism by analyzing the trend in research related to the recidivism of sexual crime for the last 20 years. To achieve this purpose, this study analyzed publication trends in research related to the recidivism of sexual crime by utilizing 139 studies published between 2000 and 2021 and conducted a keyword network analysis by using keywords extracted from these studies. The main results are as follows. First, results of publication trend by research area show that research related to the recidivism of sexual crimes was conducted in 11 areas order of 43.9% in law, 23.0% in public administration, and 17.9% in psychological science. Second, results of frequency analysis in keywords appeared in 139 studies show that the frequency was high in the following order; ‘sexual crime’, ‘prevention of recidivism’, ‘electronic monitoring system’, ‘risk of recidivism’, ‘child sex crime’, ‘medication treatment for sexual impulse’, and ‘personal information disclosure of sexual offender’. Third, results of degree centrality analysis using keywords show that the degree centrality was high in the following order; ‘sexual crime’, ‘prevention of recidivism’, ‘electronic monitoring system’, ‘recidivism of sexual crime’, ‘medication treatment for sexual impulse’, ‘risk of recidivism’, and ‘child sex crime’. Fourth, results of CONCOR cluster analysis with keywords show that research related to the recidivism of sexual crime was classified into nine clusters, and a major cluster was ‘study of electronic monitoring system’. Based on these results, this study suggests the directions of future studies on the prevention of recidivism from sexual crime.