International scholarly activity among academic librarians in the United States

Abstract

The extent of U.S. librarians’ collaboration with international partners in the area of scholarly activity and research publications is still unexplored. Guided by Jane Knight’s “At Home” framework for international research and scholarly activity, this study examines the extent of scholarly activity between librarians from the United States and international institutional and individual collaborators (that is, conference attendance, collaborations and staff exchanges, publications and collaborative authorship). A total of 193 U.S. academic librarians participated in an online survey. The results show that international research and scholarly activity is rare among U.S. librarians. Among the librarians who do participate in these activities, the results indicate that their participation in international conferences is associated with more internationalization activities.