The processes of social confinement caused by the global health crisis (COVID-19), have forced professors to assume new research competencies that allow them to improve science indicators and contribute to the research culture in the digital era for the Latin American region. This article analyzes the research culture of Latin American professors in 20 countries in the digital era, and their relationship with the production of scientific papers indexed in the Journal Citation Report (JCR) between 1996 and 2019. A questionnaire (with validity and reliability criteria) with a Likert-type scale was applied to 2,215 professors selected from five international scientific events. The main results show that 78% of the professors have less than 15 years of teaching experience, with ages under 44 years of age and 38.9% of them with an undergraduate academic level, 62.5% of whom responded that they have never published in indexed journals, and that they do not know the proper application of paradigms and research designs. On the other hand, 23.86% of the total citations are self-citations. Therefore, the results reflect a significant relationship between the research culture of professors and Latin American scientific production. Finally, Latin American professors have found themselves in economic, political and social circumstances that affect good research and scientific publication practices, leaving a training gap in research competencies in the new digital era.