The Review of Accounting Studies at age 25: a retrospective using bibliometric analysis

The Review of Accounting Studies (RAST) recently completed 25 years of publication. We provide a descriptive analysis of RAST's characteristics that should interest the stakeholders who have been part of the journal's evolution. We benchmark RAST's characteristics against the other top accounting journals: Journal of Accounting and Economics, Journal of Accounting Research, the Accounting Review, and Contemporary Accounting Research. We provide information on RAST's most prominent subject matter themes, methodologies used by RAST authors, the journals citing RAST, RAST's most highly cited papers for different periods, and affiliated institutions and countries of RAST's most prolific and cited authors. Results show that RAST has developed unique expertise in valuation and financial statement analysis, arguably becoming the market leader despite being the youngest journal among its peer group. It now publishes the highest number of articles among non-association journals. RAST continues to make inroads into Asian countries emerging as new research centers.