Research Collaboration, Workplace-Related Satisfaction, and Faculty Socialization: Insights from a Korean case university study

This research examines collaborative activity between expatriate academics, both with and without Korean ethnicity, and their (native Korean) peers both intra-organizationally (e.g. at department, college, and university levels) and in terms of location (e.g. within Korea, in Asia, outside of Asia). Collaboration is further explored vis-à-vis workplace satisfaction and socialization metrics. Ethnically Korean expatriate faculty are more likely to engage in cooperative research at the departmental, college, and university levels. Non-ethnically Korean expatriate faculty collaborate more outside of Asia, within Asia, and to lesser extents within Korea and at the case university. There is an inverse relationship between salary satisfaction and collaboration, yet collaborators as a group are more satisfied with the availability of graduate students. Other variables examined vis-à-vis collaboration include feelings of isolation, overall workplace satisfaction, the administrative stance of the department, socializing within the department, and feeling uninformed about funding opportunities.