A study on the relationship between the research productivity and English proficiency level of the academicians

The importance of the scientific research has increased with the growing scientific information and technology in the era that we live in. Even though their functions and features are different, all the universities around the world aim both to increase the quality of education and to rank at the top of the ranking systems in terms of scientific productivity. In line with this goal, as the rivalry between the world universities is increasing globally, a competition to be the most productive and most favoured university has emerged nationally. So, the universities that want to rank on the top of the most productive universities should first focus on enabling their academicians to be more productive and qualified. However, the studies carried out on research productivity have revealed that the academicians haven't been able to reach the amount of productivity expected from them due to several variables. Some of the environmental variables such as inadequacy of the resources and restricted time to be used to carry out research, too much work load to do research, the difficulties of getting seniority and promotion, and certain individual variables such as age, gender, marital status, title, unfruitful working habits, lack of motivation, etc. were found to prevent academicians from being productive researchers . Another factor that may hinder academicians to publish productively in the international academic journals could be their English proficiency level. Almost all of the journals in the databases like 'Web of Science' accept the articles written in English. Therefore, the academicians who aren't proficient enough in English are having difficulty in both searching and publishing in the journals that are included in that kind of databases. So, this study has been carried out in order to reveal the relationship between the academicians' research productivity and their English proficiency level. The sample of the study includes the academicians working at 8 different faculties within 18 universities in different regions of Turkey. A questionnaire, in which there are three different parts, was sent to these academicians. In the first part of the questionnaire, the demographical information of the academicians was asked while in the second part the number of their publications was asked. In the third part, on the other hand, Cambridge Level Test which measures their proficiency level was applied on the academicians. 140 academicians who participated in the study reported the exact number of their publications and their h-index scores on the databases of 'Google Scholar' and 'Web of Science' were also gathered and included in the data set. This data set was analysed using the Jamovi 2.4.11 program. Multivariate regression analysis revelaed that English proficiency scores of the academicians were statistically significant predictors of their research productivity as measured by the 'Google scholar h-index scores. 'Google Scholar', which enables people easily reach various books, journals, articles, MA and PhD theses written in many different languages and also provides h-index scores that are used to measure the publication and citation numbers, is a more comprehensive data base including publications botn in English and Turkish, so the fact that English proficiency scores significantly predict 'Google Akademik' h-index scores is an expected and desired finding. However, it was also found that English proficiency scores of the academicians are not significant predictors of their h-index scores and international publication numbers gathered from 'Web of Science' and possbile reasons of this situation were discussed. At the same time the titles of the academicians were also found to significnatly predict their research productivity. This finding is also consistent with the findings of the previous studies that vere carrioud out on this topic before; as title increases, the amount of productivity also increases. Keywords: Academician, Research Productivity, English Proficiency Level