CELEBRATING 50 YEARS OF THE REVISTA INTERAMERICANA DE PSICOLOGIA/ INTERAMERICAN JOURNAL OF PSYCHOLOGY: A CONTENT ANALYSIS

The Revista Interamericana de Psicologia/Interamerican Journal of Psychology (RIP/IJP) was first published in 1967. During its fifty-year history, the goal of the journal has been to promote collaboration and communication among psychologists on the Americas through the dissemination of theoretical and applied research. The authors reviewed 1,200 articles published in the RIP/IJP between 1967 and 2016 (Volumes 1-50). The articles were coded into seven main content categories, which included type of article, research design, sample characteristics, data collection strategies, data analysis, thematic analysis, and author’s characteristics and affiliations. Results indicated that up to date, 2,688 authors from 30 identified countries have contributed research on a diverse array of psychological topics on primarily three languages: Spanish, English, and Portuguese. Data also suggest these articles are characterized by a broad range of research methodologies, data collection procedures and analysis, and sample characteristics.

participant demographics (e.g.age, gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation), data collection and analysis procedures, and main topics categories encompass the legacy and mission to advance future psychological research in the Americas.

Method Design
This manuscript was based on a 50-year content analysis of Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP)/Interamerican Journal of Psychology.Babbie (2010) define a content analysis as a qualitative research technique used to interpret and code published material.The primary focus of a content analysis is to examine trends in the literature, such as to determine the status of research in a particular field, how many authors are publishing on that topic, type of articles, and the impact of a publication (Little, Akin-Little, & Lloyd, 2011).Content analysis of journals are important because they allow us to determine the impact and scope of that publication in the field, the publication trends (topics covered) throughout the decades, who are the leading authors, what is the mission of the journal, and the target audience among others (Delgado-Romero, Stanley Jr., & Oh, 2017).Therefore, the purpose of this content analysis was to examine the scientific contributions of the Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP) to the psychology in the Americas during the past 50 years.Most specifically, to provide an overview of the publication trends and major psychology content areas being studied.In this content analysis, the primary focus was to investigate and categorize the specialty areas of psychology that were frequently published in the RIP/IJP.

Raters
A total of six individuals participated as raters for this content analysis.Of those six, two were psychology professors, two were advanced doctoral students, and two were undergraduate students.The raters came from four different countries Puerto Rico, Argentina, Brazil, and the United States.They also were fluent in at least two languages, which included Spanish, English, and Portuguese.The first and second authors created the coding categories and trained the raters who assisted in the data collection process.Following the initial training, inter-rater reliability rates were calculated in order to determine agreement and consistency among raters.Selected articles from the 2017 51 (1) issue were provided to the raters for their review, once all coding was completed the percentage of agreement was calculated.The percentage of agreement among raters was 93% and deemed appropriate to start data collection.As data collection progressed, raters will discuss their disagreements with the main authors in order to reach consensus.

Procedures
For the purposes of this content analysis the authors examined all issues of the Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP)/Interamerican Journal of Psychology from 1967 (Volume 1) through 2016 (Volume 50).The total sample of reviewed articles (n=1,200) included all scientific publications.Scientific publications were identified as those included in the articles section, viewpoints, brief reports, and student awards section of the journal.The majority of these articles could also be easily identified because they include an abstract, introduction, methods, results, discussion, and references.This content analysis did not include editorials, books reviews, introductions to special issues, and bibliographies since these productions do not reflect scientific material or original material produced by the authors.

Content Categories
Deductive and inductive procedures were employed to develop the content categories.First, the main authors reviewed previous content analyses on the RIP/IJP (e.g., Cassepp Borges, 2004;Salazar, 1997) and content analyses published on other Latin American journals (e.g., Ardila, Pérez Acosta, & Gutiérrez, 2005;Carrillo Ávila, Ripoll Núñez, & Ruiz, 2008;VandenBos & Winkler, 2015) to determine previous content categories.During the second phase, inductive procedures were employed to modify previously identified categories and to develop additional categories based on the areas that were not addressed on the previous content analyses (Cokley, Awosogba, & Taylor, 2014).Based on these procedures the first and second author developed a coding book on Google docs that included the following categories: (1) Author's Affiliation: This category was developed to gather demographic data on the authors.Coding categories for authors included institution, country, type of affiliation (university, private practice, school, government agency, hospital, community clinic, and other), language of article (Spanish, English, Portuguese, French, or combined) and gender (male, female).
(2) Type of Article: Articles were coded as empirical, theoretical, or other.Empirical studies included quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods studies.Theoretical articles included conceptual pieces that were subdivided into historical, epistemological, literature reviews, and practice pieces.A category labeled as "other" was created to classify commentaries, editorials, book reviews, and bibliographies.However, this "other" category was not included on the final content analysis. .Participants' gender was coded as male, female, mixed (sample included both males and females), and not applicable (for non-empirical studies).Race/ethnicity was codes as White, Latino/Hispanic, Black/African-American, Indigenous/American Indian, Biracial, Mixed (sample included more than one ethnic/racial group), "other", and not applicable (for non-empirical studies).Disabilities were coded as visual, auditory, motor, cognitive, and not applicable (for non-empirical studies).Socio-economic status was coded using social classification system (upper, middle, lower), mixed (sample included participants from various SES), and not applicable (for non-empirical studies).(5) Data Collection Strategies: This category was use to code the data collection strategies employed on the studies that were reviewed.Quantitative articles were coded as surveys, laboratory experiment, field experiment (observation and field notes), and psychological tests.Qualitative articles were coded as semistructured interviews, focus groups, secondary data analysis (content or bibliometric analysis), and data mining.A category of "not applicable" was created for non-empirical studies.(6) Data Analysis Procedures: This category was use to code the data analysis strategies that were employed on the studies that were examined.Articles were coded as quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods data analysis strategies.Quantitative strategies included descriptive statistics (mean, mode, frequency analysis); inferential statistics (t-test, ANOVA, MANOVA, correlation, regression, chi-square); and advanced models (MLM, Path Analysis, factor analysis, EFA, CFA, HLM, SEM).Qualitative strategies inductive (Grounded Theory), deductive (QCA), and combined (content analysis).Mixed-methods strategies were coded as combined (statistical and qualitative analysis).A category of "not applicable" was created for nonempirical studies.(7) Thematic Analysis: This category was developed to determine first, the primary topic of the article (area of psychology addressed in the article) and secondly, specific themes that emerged from keywords or phrases.
The categories for the thematic analysis were developed taking into consideration the different areas of specialty in psychology.The themes were analyzed in two axes and through two different techniques.
Following traditional content analysis procedures, the first technique generated a list of categories that emerged from a comparison of word analysis conducted on the titles of the articles of the first four decades of the RIP/IJP, for this technique with incorporated the use of two judges (Polanco, 2016).Secondly, the main authors employed mixed methods, through the use automatic thematic classification of the abstracts by using NVivo (Version 11) software.In other words, we read the abstract and look for keywords that could assist in the generation of content categories.

Results
A content analysis of the Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP)/Interamerican Journal of Psychology celebrates a half-century of theoretical, applied and professional psychological research from 30 identified countries (Table1).The scholarly trajectory of RIP/IJP's mission to expand, preserve and disseminate psychology in the Americas is derived from the investigations of 2,688 (i.e. total number of authors from all articles) researchers.Collectively, they have contributed a total sample size of 287,924 research participants within the 1,200 scientific articles published in RIP/IJP .The diversity of published research in the RIP/IJP has also been disseminated in four identified languages (Table 1): Spanish (n = 620), English (n = 396), Portuguese (n = 180) and  French (n = 4).
Regarding this content analysis, the primary focus was to investigate and categorize the specialty areas of psychology that were frequently published in the RIP/IJP.In doing so, the academic communication and cooperation among Interamerican psychologists highlight a trajectory of past and present research developments with a focus on future directions for continued inquiry.Thus, consideration of RIP/IJP's findings is reflected in the author affiliations, frequency of article type, methodological designs, research participant demographics (e.g.age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, ability status and socio-economic status), data collection and analysis procedures.Lastly, the main topics in all categories encompass the legacy and mission to advance future psychological research in the Americas.

Author Affiliations
Over the span of RIP/IJP's existence, a total of 2,698 authors have been affiliated with universities, government agencies, hospitals, private practices, schools, community clinics and other settings.For this category, a reflection of all author affiliations is represented in Table 2.The most significant associations are contextualized in this section to emphasize the order of contributions.Throughout the five decades, authors affiliated with a university accounted for the largest number of publications in the RIP/IJP (n = 2,430).Authors affiliated with a non-identified setting generated the second largest number in this category (n = 105) and affiliation with a government agency ranked third (n= 66).Lastly, categorical affiliations to a hospital and private practice each accounted for 80 (n = 40, respectively) of the articles published during the 50-year time span.Through a gender perspective, author affiliations were comprised of 1,430 females and 1,258 males, (n = 2,688) (Table 2).According to the content analysis, males represented the highest number of author affiliations during the first decade (n = 282).However, the number of female author affiliations surpassed their male counterparts by the end of the fifth decade.Thus, females in this content analysis represent the highest number of author affiliation, (n =1,430).

Article Type
Since 1967, there have been 1,200 scientific articles published in the RIP/IJP.Over the span of fifty years, a reflection of the journal's content reflects the relevancy and importance to advance psychology in the Americas (Table 3).Considering the varying types of research, empirically based quantitative studies yielded the highest percentage, 52.5% (n = 626) of published articles.Accounting for 11.2% (n = 134) of the articles, theoretical literature reviews represented the second highest percentage in the content analysis.Third, historical theory studies accounted for 9.1% (n = 109) of the articles included in the RIP/IJP.Theoretical studies related to the practice of psychology represented 8.6% (n = 103), and empirically based qualitative studies generated 8.3% (n = 100) of the articles coded for this category.Lastly, representing the smallest percentages of this analysis, both empirically based mixed methods studies (5.3%, n = 64) and epistemological theories accounted for 5.3% (n = 64) of articles published.

Research Design and Methodology
Research articles in RIP/IJP were comprised of quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods, non-empirical, multidisciplinary, comparative studies and ex-post facto methodologies.For each methodological approach, research designs were also identified to determine the frequency of published inquiries.In this section, the most significant methodologies and research designs are contextualized.Content analysis for this category accounts for all identified articles published since RIP/IJP's inception (Table 4).For quantitative methodology, frequency of research designs used included: surveys, laboratory experiments, field experiments, quasi-experimental, instrument development and secondary data analysis.Quantitative survey methodology was the highest recurrently utilized form of methodological research, which accounted for 16.4% (n = 197) of the articles coded in this category.Subsequently, quantitative quasi-experimental designs accounted for 15.9% (n = 191) of the articles frequently published in the RIP/IJP.
Regarding qualitative methodology, identified designs in research articles were comprised of content analysis, action and participatory research, case studies, ethnography, cultural analysis, biographic, conversation analysis and focus groups.Of the all the qualitative research design articles utilized, case studies yielded the highest percentage (4%, n = 48) in this category.Lastly, content analysis generated the second highest percentage, which accounted for 1.1%, (n = 13) within this methodological design.
Of the research articles featured in the RIP/IJP, mixed methods methodology featured: action and participatory research, laboratory experiments, field experiments, field description and quasi-experimental designs.Accounting for 2.8% (n = 34), mixed methods quasi-experimental designs yielded the highest percentages within the identified research articles represented in the RIP/IJP.Other methods and designs coded for this category generated 32.2% (n = 387) for non-empirically theoretical and "other" articles, .1% (n = 1) for multidisciplinary studies, .8%(n = 10) for comparative studies and 1.9% (n = 23) for ex-post facto investigations.

Sample Size Characteristics
In the last five decades, a total of 287,924 research participants were represented in the RIP/IJP.Representative of this total were varying sample size characteristics that reflect the 1,200 scientific articles included in this content analysis.The sample characteristics assessed for age, gender/sex, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability status and socio-economic status.Totals for all sample size demographics are identified by various subdemographics categories (Table 5).For age, early adulthood was the highest identified group of participants, (n = 245).Regarding gender, the mixed category (n = 579) generated the highest in this demographic.As previously stated, the mixed category was developed to include those studies than included more than one gender category in their demographic characteristics.In terms of race/ethnicity, participants who identified as Hispanic/Latina/o comprised the largest sample size (n = 310) in this content analysis.Thereafter, self-identifying multiracial participants ranked second (n = 85), and Whites represented the third highest racial group, (n = 31).Lastly, it was noted that when examining other sample characteristics such as sexual orientation (n = 1,182), disability (n = 1,189), and socioeconomic status (n = 1,015), the category of "Not Applicable" was the one with the highest percentage.The "Not Applicable" category denotes those articles that do not include specific information regarding these sample characteristics.

Data Collection Strategies
Data collection strategies were divided into eleven main coding categories representative of different methodological approaches: Quantitative, Qualitative, and Mixed Methods.A twelve category of "Not Applicable" was created for non-empirical studies.An analysis of the different data collection strategies employed by category is summarized on Table 6.For the 1,200 scientific articles reviewed as part of this content analysis, the top six categories were as follows, the most widely utilized quantitative data collection strategies were the use of Tests or Psychometric Instruments (n = 387), followed by Surveys (n = 267), and Laboratory Experiments (n = 87) on third.When examining qualitative data collection strategies, semi-structured interviews (n = 95) were first, followed by Secondary Data Analysis (Content Analysis) (n = 82).Lastly, the category of "Not Applicable" accounted for the second largest number of articles reviewed (n = 351), suggesting that 29 % of the scientific articles reviewed for this content analysis were non-empirical.100.0 Note.This total is not representative of actual sample size, since some articles were coded in more than one category.Data is reported in relative percentages.

Data Analysis Procedures
As with the previous category, data analysis procedures were divided into three main coding categories representative of different methodological approaches: Quantitative, Qualitative, and Mixed Methods.A category of "Not Applicable" was also created for non-empirical studies.An analysis of the different data analysis procedures employed by category is summarized on Table 7.For the 1,200 scientific articles reviewed as part of this content analysis, inferential statistics (t-test, ANOVA, MANOVA, correlation, regression, chi-square) was the most frequently used data analysis strategy (n = 376).Descriptive statistics (mean, mode, frequency analysis) was the second most used data analysis strategy (n = 144); followed by advanced models (MLM, Path Analysis, factor analysis, EFA, CFA, HLM, SEM), which rated third (n = 109).The results for the qualitative data analysis strategies indicated that content analysis (n = 84) was the most widely utilized; followed by QCA (n = 16), and grounded theory (n = 9) in third.Mixed-methods strategies were used by 11.3 % (n = 51).Lastly, the "not applicable" category created for non-empirical studies accounted for 34.3 % (n = 411) of the articles reviewed, constituting the largest category in this domain.

Thematic Analysis
The focus of the thematic analysis was to provide an overview of the most common psychology topics published in the 50-year history of the RIP/IJP.In the first thematic analysis, a series of 50 basic categories of different areas of specialty in psychology were developed based on previous content analyses (e.g., Ardila, Pérez Acosta, & Gutiérrez, 2005;Cassepp Borges, 2004) and additional terms that seemed missing from the previous studies.These categories were then grouped into 10 general categories: ( 1 8 provides a summary of all the general and content categories. The 1,200 articles reviewed for this content analysis were coded using the 10 content categories described above.The first category, General Psychology was comprised of seven psychology disciplines being Cognitive and Learning Psychology (n = 48) and Experimental Psychology (n = 22) the two largest categories.The second category, Social, Community, and Cultural Psychology was the largest with eleven psychology disciplines.Cross-Cultural Psychology (n = 84) and Social Psychology (n = 70) accounted for the largest number of articles within that category.The third category, Health Psychology was the second largest and was comprised of eight psychology disciplines.Health Psychology (n = 77) and Clinical Psychology (n = 55) accounted for the largest number of articles within that category.The fourth category, Life Span Psychology was comprised of six psychology disciplines being Family Studies (n = 52) and Developmental Psychology (n = 30) the categories with most articles.The fifth category, Educational Psychology, was one of the smallest with only two disciplines included Educational Psychology and Vocational Psychology.From these two, Educational Psychology was the largest category (n =73).
The sixth category, Other Institutional and Application Fields, was also comprised by six disciplines.Industrial, Organizational, and Engineering Psychology (n = 39) and Environmental Psychology (n = 13) were the categories with the largest amount of articles published.The seventh category, Legal Issues, was also small with only two disciplines represented Legal Psychology and Forensic Psychology.From this category, Legal Psychology accounted for almost the totality of the articles (n = 10).The eighth category, Diagnosis and Evaluation, was also small with only two disciplines represented Psychopathology and Psychometrics.From this category, Psychometrics accounted for almost the majority of the articles (n = 123).The ninth category, Interdisciplinary Fields, was comprised of three disciplines with Physiological Psychology (n = 9) and Neuropsychology (n = 7) being the largest categories.The last category, Disciplinary Fields, was comprised by three disciplines.Epistemology and History (n = 81) of Psychology and Psychology, Science, and Profession (n = 65) were the categories with the most articles.
The data also revealed that from the 1,200 reviewed scientific articles the top five categories were: Social, Community and Cultural Psychology with 26% (n = 306); Health Psychology with 15% (n = 184); Disciplinary Fields with 13% (n = 155); Diagnosis and Evaluation with 12% (n = 143); and Life Span Psychology with 11 %(n = 130).These five content categories accounted for 76.5% (n = 918) of all the articles reviewed.Lastly, when examining the disciplines embedded within the general categories, the disciplines with the highest numbers of publications were as follows: Psychometrics with 10.2% (n = 123); Cross-cultural and Multicultural Psychology with 7% (n = 84); Epistemology and History of psychology with 6.7% (n = 81); Health Psychology with 6.4% (n = 77); Educational Psychology with 6.0% (n = 73); Social Psychology with 5.8% (n = 70); and Psychology, Science and Profession with 5.4% (n = 65).Not surprising, the disciplines with the highest numbers of articles published are included within the top five general categories.Lastly, an automatic thematic analysis on the Abstracts of the 1,200 articles reviewed for this content analysis was conducted utilizing NVivo software.The purpose of this secondary analysis was to determine which keywords have been the most widely employed by the authors of the RIP/IJP.The automatic thematic indicates that 20 words have the most percentage of coverage, suggesting these words appear very often on the publications of the RIP/IJP.A full summary of the words and it percentage of coverage will be outlined on Table 9.
According to the data, the top five terms were Social (n = 50, .96%);Behavior (n = 41, .79%);Group (n = 35, .60%);Level (n = 32, .59%);and Study (n = 31, .58%).The results also indicate that terms related to general fields of study in psychology, such as Social, Behavior, Development, Personality and Experimental have been widely utilized and then to be related to one another.The automatic thematic analysis further revealed the use of methodological terms such as Group, Level, Study, Factors, Effects, Subjects, Variables, and Differences.Other words crossings occur between terms related to psychological measurement such as Scales and Tests and to experimental research such as Response, Situations or Relationship.Even though the majority of the terms that emerged from this thematic analysis are directly related with different areas or topics in psychology, there are other sub-categories, like the term Differences that emerged from other disciplines such as cross-cultural studies.Lastly, the emergence of general terms such as Psychology and Study, reflect the strong production of articles in the RIP/IJP that reflects diverse methodological approaches such as theoretical and historical studies, literature reviews, and empirical studies.

Discussion
In celebration of the 50 th anniversary of the Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP), the authors of this manuscript strived to cover a wide arrange of categories, following the tradition of previous content analysis ( Cassepp Borges, 2004;Salazar, 1997), but also adding unique elements that allow readers to get a better understanding of the scope and breadth of this journal.In particular, we felt that a thorough thematic analysis was needed in order to ascertain the publication trends in psychological research that have been showcased in the RIP/IJP over the past five decades.The next paragraphs will provide a discussion of the main findings of this content analysis.
Author affiliation and characteristics was the first category investigated in this content analysis.The data reveal that from 1967-2016, 2,688 authors have published their work on the RIP/IJP number that has increased throughout the decades.These authors come from 30 identified countries with United States, Brazil, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Argentina accounting for the top five countries on the list.This finding is similar to those found in previous content analyses of the RIP/IJP (Cassepp Borges, 2004;Salazar, 1997) suggesting that these countries have established themselves as the main producers of the research articles being published in the journal.Of interest, is also the fact that the nine editors of the RIP/IJP have come from these countries, which the exception of Venezuela who is ranked six in all the content analyses.
The languages most commonly represented in the publications of the RIP/IJP were Spanish, English, and Portuguese.Currently, Spanish is the language with the most published articles.This finding is not surprising considering that previous content analyses, discussed the decline in production of English articles and an increase in articles in Spanish (Cassepp Borges, 2004;Salazar, 1997).This language shift could also be related to changes in the countries that are represented in the Editorial Board, the countries most represented in the SIP membership, and the target audience of the journal.Regarding author affiliation, it was noted that the vast majority come from universities.This finding is similar to those found in other consulted content analysis that indicates that the majority of authors are researchers or scholars affiliated with universities (e.g., Cokley, Awosogba, & Taylor, 2014;Little, Akin-Little, & Lloyd, 2011).
Lastly, the authors' gender composition has been an interesting trend to examine.Currently, females represent the majority of the authors on the RIP/IJP; however, this was not always been the case since during the first two decades male authors dominated the field.The gender shift started by the third decade and has been increasing steadily and exponentially.In the last, decade the number of female authors almost duplicated it males counterparts, which is not surprising considering the trends in the psychology field.
The second category studied as part of this content analysis was article type.Regarding the type of articles published in the RIP/IJP over the past five decades, the data suggested that the majority were empirically-based quantitative research studies, followed by literature reviews, and theoretical articles focusing either in history of psychology or professional issues.This finding is similar to the one found by Cassepp Borges (2004) who suggested the vast majority of the articles published in the RIP/IJP are considered scientific articles.This is not surprising considering that the primary mission of the RIP/IJP since its inception has been the promotion of the scientific knowledge in the field of psychology in the Americas.Thus, providing evidence that the RIP/IJP has preserved its core mission over the decades.
Another foci of this content analysis were to provide a detailed picture of the characteristics of the articles that have been published in the RIP/IJP over the past five decades.In order to fulfill that goal, the following categories were analyzed: (1) Research Design and Methodology; (2) Sample Characteristics; (3) Data Collection Strategies; and (4) Data Analysis Procedures.Regarding research design and methodology, the findings suggest that the use of quantitative methodologies account for the majority of the research published in the RIP/IJP.Quantitative survey methodology, quasi-experimental designs, instrument development, and laboratory experiments account for the top four categories.When examining, qualitative research, the use of case studies came on fifth place.Although these categories were not discussed in previous content analyses, they provide helpful information regarding the scientific rigor of the research published in the RIP/IJP.
Another category analyzed for this study was the sample characteristics.Within this domain, the authors were interested in examining demographic characteristics of the sample including age, gender race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, and socio-economic status (SES).Results from this category revealed that the majority of the studies do not include all the demographic information we were hoping for.Most articles included information on gender, age, and race/ethnicity but variables such as sexual orientation, SES, and disability were not as explored.Regarding age it was found that most of the research published in the journal is on the adult population.The gender composition of the studies tends to be mixed and the race/ethnicity of the participants was primarily Hispanic/Latino.Overall, the data seems to suggest that the samples studied tend to be diverse, which is similar to the findings of the Salazar study (1997), in which he was exploring transcultural research in the RIP/IJP.
The last two areas discussed within the domain of article characteristics include data collection strategies and data analysis procedures.The main findings in this area revealed that the primary data collection strategies employed by RIP/IJP authors included psychological tests/instruments, surveys, semi-structured interviews, laboratory experiments, and secondary data analysis.Regarding data analysis procedures, the use of inferential, descriptive, and advanced statistical models are the top three quantitative methods.These results are similar to those found in the Salazar's (1997) study which indicate that the majority of articles published in the RIP/IJP employed these primary data analysis strategies.Other data analyses strategies utilized by authors included content analysis, mixed-methods procedures, and qualitative data analyses such as grounded theory and QCA.Overall, as with previous categories, these findings reveal the scientific rigor of the research that has been published in the RIP/IJP over the past five decades.
The thematic analysis conducted as part of this content analysis revealed some interesting trends regarding the topics and psychology discipline fields most widely studied.Regarding broader content categories, the results indicate the top five categories were Social, Community and Cultural Psychology; Health Psychology; Disciplinary Fields; Diagnosis and Evaluation; and Life Span Psychology.The fact that Social, Community, and Cultural Psychology was the largest content category does not come as a surprise considering the previous studies on the RIP/IJP (Cassepp Borges, 2004;Salazar, 1997) have indicated the prominence of these topics within the research being published in the journal.This finding is also significant because it keeps with the journal tradition of promoting transcultural and cross-cultural research in the Americas (Salazar, 1997).Other areas such as Psychometrics, Developmental Psychology, Social Processes and Social Issues, Personality, and Professional Psychological and Health Related Issues has been identified in previous research (Cassepp Borges, 2004), which coincide the other top four categories.
The data also indicated that the disciplines with the highest number of publications were as follows: Psychometrics; Cross-cultural and Multicultural Psychology; Epistemology and History of psychology; Health Psychology; Educational Psychology; Social Psychology; and Psychology, Science and Profession.These results are also similar to those from previous publications, in particular Cassepp Borges' ( 2004) study that has Psychometrics as the primary category of study, followed by Developmental Psychology, and Social Processes and Social Issues.Thus, the findings of the current study appear to confirm the trajectory that have previously established by the initial content analysis studies.
Finally, the automatic thematic analysis confirms some of the results of the content analysis.For example, the word Social was identified with the highest percentage of coverage from all publications, which is not surprising considering the Social, Community, and Cultural Psychology was the top content category.This finding is similar to the content analysis conducted by Salazar (1997) examining transcultural research published in the RIP/IJP.Social issues were also found to be an important content category discussed by Cassepp Borges (2004) in the most recent content analysis.Furthermore, the additional top four words Behavior, Group, Level, and Study also confirm the publication tradition of the RIP/IJP emphasizing the study of diverse psychological phenomena across disciplines, its focus on behavior (group and individual), and within and between group differences.
The purpose of this content analysis was to examine the scientific contributions of the Revista Interamericana de Psicologia (RIP/IJP) in the past 50 years.In particular, to provide an overview of the publication trends, characteristics of the published articles, and the major psychological content areas discussed throughout the years.In this content analysis, the primary focus was to investigate and categorize the specialty areas of psychology that were frequently published in the journal.It is hoped that the findings of this content analysis will add to the understanding of the history of the RIP/IJP, its mission, areas of impact, and contributions to the dissemination of psychological knowledge in the Americas.
) General Psychology; (2) Social, Community, and Cultural Psychology; (3) Health Psychology and Allied Fields; (4) Life Span Psychology; (5) Educational Psychology; (6) Other Institutional and Application Fields; (7) Legal Issues; (8) Diagnosis and Evaluation; (9) Interdisciplinary Fields; and (10) Disciplinary Fields.Table (3) Research Design and Methodology: This category was created to gather information about the methodology and research design employed in the published studies.Articles were coded as quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods or non-empirical.Quantitative studies were coded as experimental (field or laboratory), quasi-experimental, survey, instrument development (psychometrics), and archival data (secondary data analysis).Qualitative studies were coded as case studies, ethnographic studies, cultural analysis, biographical, focus groups, Participatory Action Research (PAR), content analysis, and analysis of conversations.Mixed-methods studies were coded as experimental (laboratory or field study), descriptive (laboratory or field study), quasi-experimental, or PAR.Other categories included interdisciplinary, comparative, and ex post facto studies.Non-empirical was a category used to code theoretical articles or those previously coded as "others".(4) Sample Characteristics: This category was use to gather demographic information regarding the samples used on the studies that were examined.Coding categories in this section included sample size, type of study based on sample size, type of sample, age, gender, race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, disabilities, socio-economic status (SES), and region or country were the study was conducted.Type of study based on sample size included case studies, group studies, population studies, and not applicable (non-empirical studies).Type of sample included the following categories: clinical and non-clinical populations; professionals; students (elementary, secondary, undergraduate, graduate); animals; others, and not applicable (for non-empirical studies).Participants' age was coded based on developmental stages such as infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood (early, middle, late), and not applicable (for non-empirical studies)

Table 1
Research Publications by Country and LanguageThe total number of authors per article is not representative of this sample size.

Table 2
Author Affiliations by Decade and Gender Affiliations

Table 3
Amount and Percentage of Article Types

Table 4
Frequency and Percentage of Methodology and Research Design

Table 5
Sample Characteristics of Research ParticipantsNote.Not Applicable indicates that the article reviewed did not include that demographic information.Mixed indicates that the article included individuals who identified with multiple genders and socio-economic statuses.

Table 6
Amount and Percentage of Data Collection Strategies

Table 7
Amount and Percentage of Data Analysis Strategies Note.Data is reported in relative percentages.

Table 8
Thematic Analysis of Content Categories Note.Data is reported in relative percentages

Table 9
Percentage of Coverage of Keywords on Abstracts