A Systematic Review of Big Data: Research Approaches and Future Prospects

This review paper aims at providing a systematic analysis of articles published in various journals and related to the uses and business applications of big data. The goal is to provide a holistic picture of the place of big data in the tourism industry. The reviewed articles have been selected for the period 2013-2020 and have been classified into 8 broad categories namely business strategy and firm performance; banking and finance; healthcare; hospitality; networks and telecommunications; urbanism and infrastructures; law and legal regulations; and government. While the categories are reflective of components of tourism industries and infrastructures, the meta analysis is organized around 3 broad themes: preferred research contexts, conceptual developments, and methods used to research big data business applications. Main findings revealed that firm performance and healthcare remain popular contexts of research in the big data realm, but also demonstrated a prominence of qualitative methods over mixed and quantitative methods for the period 2013-2020. Scholars have also investigated topics involving the notions of competitive advantage, supply chain management, smart cities, but also ethics and privacy issues as related to the use of big data