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Social Sciences and Humanities
Ireland
2026

D-Index & Metrics

Social Sciences and Humanities

D-Index
78
Citations
40933
World Ranking
422
National Ranking
2

Research.com Recognitions

  • 2026 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in Ireland Leader Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in Ireland Leader Award
  • 2023 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in Ireland Leader Award
  • 2022 - Research.com Social Sciences and Humanities in Ireland Leader Award
  • 2019 - Member of Academia Europaea
  • 2015 - Member of the Royal Irish Academy
  • 2013 - Gold Medal, Royal Irish Academy Social Sciences

Overview

Rob Kitchin is affiliated with the National University of Ireland, Maynooth in Ireland. Their research primarily spans the social sciences and computer science, contributing to various subfields including media technology, sociology and political science, geography, planning and development, transportation, and political science and international relations.

The main topics of their work include:

  • Smart Cities and Technologies
  • Human Mobility and Location-Based Analysis
  • Geographic Information Systems Studies
  • E-Government and Public Services
  • Innovative Human-Technology Interaction
  • 3D Modeling in Geospatial Applications
  • Context-Aware Activity Recognition Systems

Rob Kitchin has authored and co-authored a number of research papers covering a range of subjects. Notable recent publications include:

  • "Civil liberties or public health, or civil liberties and public health? Using surveillance technologies to tackle the spread of COVID-19", 2020, published in Space and Polity
  • "Fragmented governance, the urban data ecosystem and smart city-regions: the case of Metropolitan Boston", 2020, published in Regional Studies

The research venues where Rob Kitchin frequently publishes are diverse, with repeated contributions to:

  • Dialogues in Human Geography
  • Space and Polity
  • Urban Research & Practice
  • Dialogues on Digital Society
  • Digital Geography and Society

Their co-authors with whom they have collaborated frequently include Gareth W. Young, Oliver Dawkins, Juliette Davret, Carla Maria Kayanan, and Samuel Mutter.

Rob Kitchin has contributed several book publications. A significant number were published by Bristol University Press eBooks, including titles such as "Slow Computing" (2020) and "Data Lives" (2021). Additional books have been published by Policy Press and the Institute for Urban Research at Malmö University, the latter including "Smart Cities for City Officials: A Social Sciences approach" (2021).

The scientist has been recognized with several awards, including membership in the Academia Europaea in 2019 and the Royal Irish Academy in 2015. Earlier, in 2013, Rob Kitchin received the Gold Medal from the Royal Irish Academy in the social sciences category.

Best Publications

  • The real-time city? Big data and smart urbanism

    Rob Kitchin

  • Big Data, new epistemologies and paradigm shifts:

    Rob Kitchin

  • The Data Revolution : Big Data, Open Data, Data Infrastructures and Their Consequences

    Rob Kitchin

  • Code/Space: Software and Everyday Life

    Rob Kitchin;Martin Dodge

  • Thinking critically about and researching algorithms

    Rob Kitchin

  • The data revolution : big data, open data, data infrastructures & their consequences

    Rob Kitchin

  • Mapping Cyberspace

    Martin Dodge;Rob Kitchin

  • Cognitive maps: What are they and why study them?

    Robert M. Kitchin

  • Making sense of smart cities: addressing present shortcomings

    Rob Kitchin

  • Key Thinkers on Space and Place

    Phil Hubbard;Rob Kitchin;Gill Valentine

  • Big data and human geography Opportunities, challenges and risks

    Rob Kitchin

  • Being a ‘citizen’ in the smart city: up and down the scaffold of smart citizen participation in Dublin, Ireland

    Paolo Cardullo;Rob Kitchin

  • Digital turn, digital geographies?:

    James Ash;Rob Kitchin;Agnieszka Leszczynski

  • What makes Big Data, Big Data? Exploring the ontological characteristics of 26 datasets:

    Rob Kitchin;Gavin McArdle

  • Knowing and governing cities through urban indicators, city benchmarking and real-time dashboards

    Rob Kitchin;Tracey P. Lauriault;Gavin McArdle

  • 'Out of Place', 'Knowing One's Place': Space, power and the exclusion of disabled people

    Rob Kitchin

  • Rethinking maps

    Unknown

  • Cyberspace: The World in the Wires

    Rob Kitchin

  • Atlas of cyberspace

    Martin Dodge;Rob Kitchin

  • A Dictionary of Human Geography

    Noel Castree;Rob Kitchin;Alisdair Rogers

  • The International Encyclopedia of Human Geography

    Nigel Thrift;Rob Kitchin

  • The Data Revolution

    Rob Kitchin

Frequent Co-Authors

Reginald G. Golledge
Reginald G. Golledge University of California, Santa Barbara
Mark Blades
Mark Blades University of Sheffield
Noel Castree
Noel Castree University of Technology Sydney
Nigel Thrift
Nigel Thrift University of Bristol
Sarah Elwood
Sarah Elwood University of Washington
Gill Valentine
Gill Valentine University of Sheffield
Chris Philo
Chris Philo University of Glasgow
Phil Hubbard
Phil Hubbard King's College London
Matthew Zook
Matthew Zook University of Kentucky
Göran Finnveden
Göran Finnveden Royal Institute of Technology

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