Value Relevance in Sustainability and ESG: A Bibliometric Analysis
Abstract
The growing emphasis on sustainability and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) disclosure has repositioned non-financial information as a critical input in investors' decision-making, yet a systematic mapping of the intellectual structure and thematic evolution of value relevance literature in this context remains limited. Grounded in the decision usefulness perspective, this study conducts a bibliometric analysis to map publication trends, key contributors, thematic clusters, and emerging research directions in value relevance research on sustainability and ESG. A dataset of 151 peer-reviewed articles was retrieved from the Scopus database using the search string "value relevance" AND ("sustainability" OR "ESG"), filtered to the Business, Management and Accounting subject area. Co-occurrence, co-authorship, and citation analyses were performed using RStudio with the bibliometrix package. The findings reveal substantial publication growth particularly after 2016, driven by expanding regulatory pressure on non-financial reporting. Sustainability (Switzerland) and Business Strategy and the Environment emerge as the most productive journals, while Lourenço, Branco, and Curto are the most influential authors. India and Korea lead in research output, with growing contributions from Southeast Asian countries including Indonesia and Malaysia. Keyword co-occurrence analysis identifies four thematic clusters: value relevance and ESG disclosure, sustainability governance, firm value and methodology, and corporate accountability. Temporal analysis reveals a research shift from sustainability disclosure toward substantive ESG performance measurement, accelerated by the adoption of international reporting standards such as ISSB. These findings contribute to the theoretical development of sustainability accounting literature and provide a structured research agenda for future ESG value relevance studies across diverse institutional contexts.
Keywords: Value relevance, ESG, sustainability, bibliometric analysis, decision usefulness, sustainability reporting
