International branch campuses (IBCs) are becoming an alternative to domestic higher education institutions. Through interviews with Chinese undergraduates at a British IBC in China, this article examines the choice of a British IBC, using a combined model as the conceptual framework. It finds that the factors both affecting college choice and…

Decades of research have been conducted on the factors [i.e. family socioeconomic status (SES), urban-rural divide (household registration) and high-school type] associated with higher education selection. However, few studies have disentangled the relationship between each factor and the mechanisms of inequality among these factors in higher…

This study extends Boudon's positional theory to understand how students from different social origins make choices about university and how they interpret risks during the choice-making process in contemporary China. I draw upon empirical evidence from 71 in-depth semi-structured interviews with undergraduates from different social backgrounds…

Drawing on in-depth interview data from 31 mainland Chinese (MLC) students in a Hong Kong university, this article conceptualises MLC and Hong Kong higher education as two dissonant but interrelated subfields of the Chinese higher education field. The article argues that these MLC students' habitus, one that possesses rich economic, social and…

Since the late 1990s, China has dramatically increased its college enrollments, the number and diversity of its higher education institutions, university tuition fees, and financial aid. Now students from a wider range of backgrounds have significantly more opportunities to attend college and also compete for entry into more selective…