SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article

Front. Neurol.

Sec. Sleep Disorders

Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fneur.2025.1412152

Global Trends and Hotspots in Exercise Therapy for Insomnia Research: Bibliometric and Visual Analysis

Provisionally accepted
  • Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Objective: This study analyzes trends and hotspots in the research on exercise for insomnia using bibliometric methods and visually presents key information in the field. Methods: Using Web of Science Core Collection as a source of literature, Microsoft Excel 2019, CiteSpace, VOSviewer, and the Bibliometrix package based on R language software were used to create visualization graphs and analyze the publications by country and region, institution, journal, author, reference, and keyword. Results: This study included 1,419 papers. The overall number of publications showed an increasing trend, and the highest number of papers in this field were published by the United States and China by country, the University of California System in the United States by institution, and Markus Gerber from Switzerland by author. The trends and hotspots in this field identified through keyword analysis include “insomnia,” exercise,” “depression,” “older adults,” and “quality of life.” Conclusion: The research field of exercise therapy for insomnia is receiving increasing attention, and this study provides a clear and intuitive reference for researchers.

Keywords: Exercise, insomnia, Sleep, Quality of Life, Bibliometrics

Received: 04 Apr 2024; Accepted: 07 Apr 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Li, Liang and Fan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Tonggang Fan, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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