A snapshot of Australian nursing scholarship 1993-1994

This study investigates Australian nursing academics' publications in nursing and health journals in 1993-94. It describes the personal and professional characteristics of the authors, characteristics of the articles and interactions among these characteristics. Frequency descriptions were done to describe data and cross-tabulations were used to investigate relationships. The major findings about the authors are that few nurse-academics are publishing, that those who do publish are mainly senior academics, and that there are differences in publication rates among the states. The major findings about articles were that the majority of articles were in domestic journals, the major type of scholarship is research scholarship and that there is a shift away from teaching scholarship articles. The major focus of research scholarship is medical-surgical-nursing, with a quantitative approach, correlational design, convenience sample and no theoretical framework. Recommendations are made for further research which does not restrict scholarship to that appearing in journals and which investigates factors that constrain and facilitate scholarship.