Search for descriptors that characterize an emerging discipline in WoS and SCOPUS: the case of mathematics education

Some social sciences become very complex due to de links and specific connexions with some others disciplines. This fact explains the necessity of identifying which are the main descriptors or keywords that characterize unequivocally their scientific production. One example of this is the case of mathematics education. This case is also special due to the existing ambiguity in the identification of validated keywords for it. Thus, it becomes necessary to establish a list of descriptors that characterize a research article as a Mathematics Education one. We present a methodology to obtain a core descriptors list for accessing to the Mathematic Education articles published in journals indexed by both the Web of Sciences (WoS) and SCOPUS databases during a period of time of 30 years, since 1980 up to 2009.