Documenting the knowledge of pro-environmental travel behaviour research: a visual analysis using CiteSpace

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to present a comprehensive knowledge mapping and an in-depth analysis of pro-environmental travel behaviour research to better understand the global trend in this field that have emerged between 2000 and 2021.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, a visual analysis of 187 scholarly articles between the year 2000 and 2021 related to pro-environmental travel behaviour (PETB) is presented. Using the knowledge mapping based on CiteSpace it presents the current research status, which contains the analysis of collaboration network, co-citation network, and emerging trends.FindingsThe results revealed that the PETB is an emerging topic, which has an increased number of publications in recent years. Though the collaboration network between scholars is dispersed, some countries exert stronger collaboration network. Researchers from England, USA and China have worked more on this topic comparatively. “Pro-environmental norm” is found to be the major concern in regard to PETB, and the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) is the most common theory used by the scholars around the world. Ten articles with the highest citations are found to be the most valuable articles. COVID-19, value orientation, negative spillover, carbon footprints, biospheric and adolescent are some of the latest keywords based on the past two years' literature review, all of which have huge research potential in the future.Originality/valueThis study is among the pioneers to shed some light on the current research progress of PETB by using a bibliometric analysis to provide research directions for scholars. Moreover, this study utilized latest data from 2000 to 2021. The studies which are published before and during the pandemic are also incorporated.