Does Ethnicity Matter in Intentions to Study Abroad? Analysis of High School Students in Estonia

Abstract

Acknowledgements: We are very grateful to the helpful comments of the anonymous referees. The research leading to these results has also received funding from the Institutional Research Grant No. IUT2-17 of the Ministry of Education and 1250 Science Estonia, Grant No. 9247 of the Estonian Science Foundation, and from European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP/2007(FP/ -2013) / ERC Grant Agreement n. 615159 (ERC Consolidator Grant DEPRIVEDHOODS, Socio-spatial inequality, deprived neighbourhoods, and neighbourhood effects). This is the author's Post-print version (final draft post-refereeing as accepted for publication by the journal). The definitive, peer-reviewed and edited version of this article is published as: Pungas, E., Täht, K., Realo, A. & Tammaru, T. (2015) DOES ETHNICITY MATTER IN INTENTIONS TO STUDY ABROAD? ANALYSIS OF HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES IN ESTONIAAbstract. This paper examines factors that shape intentions to study abroad. Previous research highlights the importance of various forms of capital-human, economic, social, cultural and mobility capital-as well as of personality traits in the formation of the intention to complete education in foreign countries. Our specific focus is on ethnic differences in going to study abroad. The data comes from a representative survey of high school graduates in Estonia. We apply multilevel binary regression in order to capture both individual and school effects in the formation of study intentions. Our key findings reveal, first, that there exist significant ethnic differences in the willingness to continue studies abroad despite controlling for individual characteristics, including various forms of capital and the personality traits. Second, ethnic differences disappear once we control for the study language of the school. The institutional context thus 3 DOES ETHNICITY MATTER IN INTENTIONS TO STUDY ABROAD? ANALYSIS OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS IN ESTONIAAbstract. This paper examines factors that shape intentions to study abroad. Previous research highlights the importance of various forms of capital-human, economic, social, cultural and mobility capital-as well as of personality traits in the formation of the intention to complete education in foreign countries. Our specific focus is on ethnic differences in going to study abroad. The data comes from a representative survey of high school graduates in Estonia. We apply multilevel binary regression in order to capture both individual and school effects in the formation of study intentions. Our key findings reveal, first, that there exist significant ethnic differences in the willingness to continue studies abroad despite controlling for individual characteristics, including various forms of capital and the personality traits. Second, ethnic differences disappear once we control for the study language of the school. The institutional context thus plays an important role in the formation of ethnic differences in educational aspirations.

Study choices and returns of international students: On the role of cultural and economic capital of the family

“…Besides these studies, which use empirical material from the highly competitive and expensive U.S. and U.K. university systems, a self‐selection of students who tend to come from families with “higher social origin” has also been observed in Finland and Norway, that is, in countries with generous universal support systems that encourage a large share of national students to study abroad (Wiers‐Jenssen, ). A study of Estonian students not only confirms the association between cultural capital and intentions to study abroad but also finds important differences between the plans of ethnic Estonians and students from the Russian speaking minority (Pungas, Taeht, Realo, & Tammaru, ). This kind of self‐selection also applies to German secondary school students with international experiences (Gerhards & Hans, ).…”

“…To measure the cultural capital of the students' families, we use information about the education of their parents. This is based on the fact that education represents the institutionalised form of cultural capital in the original Bourdiean framework (see Bourdieu, ) and has been previously used to operationalise the concept in research on international student mobility and the intergenerational transfer of cultural capital (e.g., Gerhards & Hans, ; Møllegaard & Jæger, ; Perna & Titus, ; Pungas et al, ; Salisbury et al, ).…”

The intergenerational social mobility of internationally mobile students: The status attainment of returnees from abroad compared with non‐returnees

“…As previous research on ISM confirms, ISM participants are generally from families with considerable parental resources with regard to economic capital and education (Bahna, 2018; J. Waters & Brooks, 2010; Pungas, Taeht, Realo, & Tammaru, 2015; Salisbury, Paulsen, & Pascarella, 2010; Salisbury, Umbach, Paulsen, & Pascarella, 2009; Wiers‐Jenssen, 2012). Analysing the German case between 1991 and 2012, Netz and Finger (2016) confirm that study abroad remained socially selective during the whole period.…”

Who benefits most from studying abroad? A conceptual and empirical overview

“…Messer & Wolter, 2007 ; Netz, 2015 ), ethnicity (e.g. Netz & Sarcletti, 2021 ; Pungas et al, 2015 ; Simon & Ainsworth, 2012 ), and social origin (e.g. Di Pietro, 2020 ; Lingo, 2019 ; Netz & Finger, 2016 ; Waters & Brooks, 2010 ), previous experience with spatial mobility (e.g.…”