Collaboration Returns From International Co-authorships And Its Antecedents:The Case Of Native Scholars From Mainland China

In recent years,more and more Chinese scholars have been engaged in international academic exchange and the phenomenon of international co-authorship from Chinese scholars have been received great attention from academics.At present,the research on international co-authorship mainly focuses on the following three aspects:(1)Research on the motivation of international co-authorship,exploring the driving factors of international co-authorship such as discipline specialization,proximity,and “preferential attachment” mechanism.(2)Research on the characteristics of international co-authorship,using scientific measurement to reveal international co-authorship trends,discipline differences,geographical distribution,country and institution characteristics,and co-authorship network characteristics.(3)The study of the influence of International co-authorship on research impact focuses on the analysis of the differences in the cited quotation of international co-authored papers from the national,institutional,and disciplinary levels.For the study of collaboration returns from international co-authorship,the existing literature mainly study the phenomenon of international co-authorship at the macro level,comparing the cited differences between international co-authored papers and non-international co-authored papers(such as independent paper written by a single author,domestic co-authored papers).But there is a lack of research on Chinese native scholars' collaboration returns from international co-authorship at the microscopic level.That is to say,there are few literature study the difference in citations before and after the publication of a particular international co-authored paper using individual scholars as the objects of analysis.In addition,for the research on the driving factors of scholars' international collaboration returns,the existing literature mainly focuses on the influence of the differences in disciplines,country differences,the number of co-workers on internationalcollaboration returns,and it is less concerned how native scholars' individual characteristics(resource,relationship)influence the collaboration returns of international co-authorship.We defines "Chinese native scholars" as those who have obtained undergraduate or professional qualifications from full-time colleges and universities in mainland China and have been employed by Chinese mainland universities or research institutions.Based on resource-based theory and relational capital theory,taking the native scholars from mainland China with international co-authorship in 39 leading management journals as the sample,the article employs paired samples test and regression model and empirically investigates whether Chinese native scholars could capture the positive collaboration returns from international co-authorship,and how the characteristics of resources and relational capital held by native scholars influence the collaboration returns.The empirical results show that:(1)Chinese native scholars could receive positive collaboration returns from international co-authorship.(2)The resource characteristics of Chinese native scholars have a positive impact on the international collaboration returns.The reputation of Chinese native scholars have significant positive effect on both short-term and long-term returns from international co-authorship;the impact of experience of native scholars on collaboration returns depends on the measurement of “experience”: early publishing experience in international journals positively influence both short-term and long-term international collaboration returns;while the number of article published in international journal yield significant influence on its long-term returns,and do not have significant impact on short-term returns.(3)The characteristics of relational capital held by native scholars positively influence the long-term returns,but it does not significantly affect the short-term returns.The long-term return from international co-authorship is significantly positively related to the personal characteristics of Chinese native scholars such as direct ties and collaboration diversity,and the influence of cooperative diversity is the mostsignificant.The research results have important implications for scholars establishing or participating international co-authorship to improve their international influence.(1)Chinese native scholars should actively participate in international academic exchanges in order to gain return from international co-authorship.(2)Chinese native scholars should actively expand the international academic network,not only to establish direct links with more scholars,but also to cooperate with researchers as much as possible.(3)Chinese universities should strengthen policy support,encourage local scholars to expand their academic network and attract more heterogeneous partners to enhance their relationship capital and obtain benefits from international co-authorship.