Mr. Chitradeep Das, Sudipta Sarkar
Homelessness remains a global challenge, which raises questions on the basic requirements (i.e., food, clothing and shelter or habitat) of a human being in society. Globally, 318 million people are homeless, which approximately makes up the entire population of the United States (Annual report, UN-Habitat, 2024). This study attempts a bibliometric analysis of publications on the homeless population, sourced from the Web of Science database between 1989 and 2025. The study used seven impactful research contributions to determine descriptive statistics, including selected country-wise homeless populations; document type, year-wise publication and citation trends; country-wise contributions; Web of Science indexes; author contributions; and most cited publications, Universities, and publishers’ contributions. The research trend indicates a steady rise in such publications over the years. While recent publication counts fluctuate slightly, citation levels remain high. Western countries such as the USA, Canada, Brazil, and England have significantly more publications than other countries; there is a visible disparity in the number of publications from other countries in this field. The citation network analysis identifies highly cited, influential studies that have shaped research on the homeless population; the network of journals highlights relationships among the most impactful journals in the dataset through citation links. The author keyword co-occurrence network reflects the most dominant and frequent keywords in this field. The 570 publications received a total of 14230 citations over 36 years, indicating the vitality of the study. The thematic map and co-occurrence analysis of author keywords reveal that research increasingly focuses on public health, healthcare services, mortality, and social outcomes. Meanwhile, topics such as COVID-19, urban housing, women, families, and risk factors are emerging and becoming more specialised. Notably, there are too few studies on laws, policies, and programs for homeless people. The study calls for further research to comprehensively address the structural and individual aspects of homelessness, aiming to inform policies better aligned with SDG 11.1, which seeks to achieve universal access to safe, affordable housing and improved slum conditions by 2030.