A qualitative inquiry of doctoral students' herding in education and validation of ‘herding in educational decisions’ scale

Abstract

Fresh PhD recipients are experiencing restricted career opportunities yet the enrolment of PhD Scholars is increasing rapidly. Perhaps, doctoral students lack conscious educational decision-making. Building on such a perspective of doctoral students' unconscious educational choices, we explored their educational choices throughout their life trajectory. We started with a qualitative inquiry of 18 different PhD scholars in Pakistan. The findings helped us in developing a measure to determine the extent of herding in doctoral students' educational decisions. We 'benefitted from' this opportunity and validated the scale in two separate quantitative inquiries for conducting an exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis. The study concluded a 3-dimensional scale (consisting of 15items) for measuring 'herding in educational decisions'. The study offers certain implications for conscious educational decisions. Doctorat frais les récipiendaires connaissent des opportunités de carrière restreintes, mais ils'inscris au doctorat. Le nombre d'universitaires augmente rapidement. Peut-être que les doctorants manquent de prise de décision consciente en matière d'éducation. Partant d'une telle perspective des choix éducatifs inconscients des doctorants, nous avons exploré leurs choix éducatifs tout au long de leur trajectoire de vie. Nous avons commencé