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Effect of academic field and gender on college-bound migration in Japan

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Abstract

This study investigates college-bound migration flow in Japan using national-scale data from 2003 to 2014. The results, through a zero-inflated count data model regression, show the influence of academic field, network, and gender, as well as geographic and socioeconomic determinants, on college-bound migration, wherein such determinants are intertwined. Migration stocks increase the quantity of college-bound migration. Although, as expected, the migration ratios higher for natural sciences and for male students, gender differences were not found in the humanities and science, and female engineering students have a higher tendency to migrate. The total tendency of field effect is similar to the lower selectivity categories and different from the upper categories. Regional differences were also identified in relation to academic field and selectivity: 10 prefectures showed positive net migration (mainly from local to center) in all fields combined while in medicine, there were 28 prefectures in the opposite direction (mainly from center to local). Further, there are more outbound students for selective institutions in the western and metropolitan areas than in northeastern Japan. These results suggest that, to understand college-bound migration, there is a need to account for the intertwined effects of academic fields.

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Notes

  1. The female ratio was 13.7% in physics, 4.0% in mechanical engineering, 71.1% in literature, 89.7% in home economics, and 89.3% in nursing in 2014, according to the School Basic Survey in Japan.

  2. In Japan today, the total number of high school graduates is not expected to increase. For the target period from 2003 to 2014 in this study, the number of students for first enrollment had not changed (0.6% increase from 2003), with increases in enrollment rate (about 10% increase) and decreases in the number of high-school graduates (about 20% decrease), as a result of declining birth rates in Japan (less than 2.0 since 1975).

  3. The total is based on the amount in 2017. The fee for national universities is based on the standard amount proposed by MEXT, but most national ones might follow it. The municipal tuition was calculated by out-of-prefecture students.

  4. The other problem is that the total value of the estimation matrix of origin and destination does not become equal to the total value of the measured values. A family of spatial interaction models, including the entropy maximization model, solves the problem (Wilson 1975).

  5. HEIs were established, merged, or abolished in Japan for the target period of 12 years. The study only targeted HEIs with a program for undergraduates and excluded HEIs with graduate schools only.

  6. There were attempts to classify Japanese universities. The most frequently used one was Amano (1986), but it is already over a quarter of a century old, and the number of HEIs is currently increasing by more than 170%. Recent attempts also have some issues, such as the classification of national universities (Murase 2009). Liberal arts colleges are adjusted according to their scores in national entrance examinations for HEIs.

  7. There are several arts/humanities HEIs. Exceptionally, two selective HEIs with large student bodies do not report their new students’ majors, which affects the variable of selective migration by field.

  8. It is important to note that the share of the category “others” in academic fields reached 12.9% in 2014, which includes new and multidisciplinary departments such as “science and technology” instead of “engineering.” Therefore, the academic fields discussed in this paper were based on the traditional framework.

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Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to the anonymous referees for their insightful comments on an earlier draft.

Funding

This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP15K03420.

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Correspondence to Maki Kato.

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The authors declared that they have no conflict of interest.

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Kato, M. Effect of academic field and gender on college-bound migration in Japan. Ann Reg Sci 62, 351–379 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00168-019-00899-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00168-019-00899-x

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