Review of Research on Visual Saliency Assessment Based on Bibliometric Analysis

LI Hesen; HUANG Yiwen

doi:10.19554/j.cnki.1001-3563.2026.12.045

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Packaging Engineering ›› 2026, Vol. 47 ›› Issue (12) : 509-521. DOI: 10.19554/j.cnki.1001-3563.2026.12.045

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Review of Research on Visual Saliency Assessment Based on Bibliometric Analysis

LI Hesen^a, HUANG Yiwen^a,b

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Abstract

In view of the lack of comprehensive sorting of relevant literature in the current research field of visual saliency assessment, the work aims to systematically analyze the current status of research in this field and summarize the research hotspots and trends. Highly cited literature closely related to visual saliency assessment from 1992 to 2025 in the Web of Science database was selected as samples. Bibliometric analysis, factor analysis, keyword co-occurrence analysis, and cluster analysis were comprehensively employed to explore research topics, evolutionary paths, and knowledge structures. Five research topics were identified, including Saliency Models and Visual Search, Computer Vision and Deep Learning, Biological Visual Mechanisms and Eye Movement Control, Image Processing and Quality Assessment, Cognitive Science and Attention Mechanisms. Four developmental stages were observed, covering Cognitive Theory Construction, Statistical Modeling, Deep Learning Application, and Multimodal & Transformer Integration. Research hotspots evolved from early topics like Eye Movement and Visual Attention to recent cutting-edge directions such as Salient Project Detection and Multimodal Learning. A knowledge framework with the logic of "What-Why-How" was constructed for visual saliency assessment. The analysis of research topics and hotspots reveals that visual saliency assessment research is progressively shifting from biologically inspired models to data-driven, multimodal integration, and lightweight model construction. Existing research gaps are identified, and future directions are proposed to provide references for subsequent studies.

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visual saliency / bibliometric analysis / knowledge graph / visualization

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LI Hesen, HUANG Yiwen. Review of Research on Visual Saliency Assessment Based on Bibliometric Analysis[J]. Packaging Engineering. 2026, 47(12): 509-521 https://doi.org/10.19554/j.cnki.1001-3563.2026.12.045

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