Motivation - Opportunity - Ability Nexus: Application to Regional Central Asian Student Mobility

Syed Zwick, Hélène (2019): Motivation - Opportunity - Ability Nexus: Application to Regional Central Asian Student Mobility.

Abstract

This study analytically distinguishes between motivational, opportunistic and ability (MOA) factors to extract important questions on international student mobility’s decision-making process in its modern configurations. We use primary data from an online questionnaire associated with semi-structured interviews submitted to Central Asian Alumni from five different countries (Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan), to test the hypothesis of a significant variation in the MOA to study abroad across five nationalities. Our findings show minimal cross-country differences. The main differences remain modest in scale and are threefold: firstly, Tajik respondents prioritize physical opportunity and capital mobility within the ability factor; Turkmen respondents emphasize the role of constrained educational supply and imaginary experience, while Uzbek respondents are the most intrinsically motivated while deciding to study abroad.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: student mobility, motivation-opportunity-ability nexus, Central Asia
• Subjects: C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C8 - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology ; Computer Programs > C83 - Survey Methods ; Sampling Methods; F - International Economics > F2 - International Factor Movements and International Business > F29 - Other; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J6 - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers > J61 - Geographic Labor Mobility ; Immigrant Workers

References

Alpes, M. J. (2014). “Imagining a future in ‘Bush’: Migration Aspirations at Times of Crisis in Anglophone Cameroon”, Identities, 21(3): 259-274.

Amabile, T.M., Hill, K.G., Hennessey, B.A. and Tighe, E.M. (1994). “The work preference inventory assessing intrinsic and extrinsic motivational orientations”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66(5): 950-967.

Bal, E. and Willems, R. (2014). “Introduction: Aspiring Migrants, Local Crises and the imagination of Futures ‘Away from Home’”, Identities-Global Studies in Culture and Power, 21(3): 249-258.

Bandura, A. (1977). “Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioural change”, Psychological Review, 84(2): 191-215.

Beck, U. and Beck-Gernsheim, E. (2002). Individualization. London: Sage.

Bettman, J. R. (1979). An information processing theory of consumer choice. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company.

Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital. In: Handbook for Theory and Research in the Sociology of Education, edited by Richardson, J.G., 241-258. New York: Greenwood Press.

Brooks, R. and Waters, J. (2011). Student mobilities, migration and the internationalization of higher education. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Carling, J. (2012). “Steps towards a theory of migration aspirations”, Paper presented at aspirations and capabilities in migration processes, International Migration Institute, Oxford.

Carling, J. (2002). “Migration in the age of involuntary immobility: theoretical reflections and Cape Verdean Experiences”, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 28(1): 5-42.

Carling, J., Ersanilli, E. and de Haas, H. (2012). “Men, women and migration aspirations: a comparative analysis of sixteen areas of origin”, Paper presented at comparative and multisited approaches to international migration, Institut national d’études démographiques (INED), Paris, December 12-14.

Carling, J. and Schewel, K. (2018). “Revisiting aspiration and ability in international migration”, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 44(6): 945-963. doi: 10.1080/1369183x.2017.1384146.

Chankseliani, M. and Hessel, G. (2016). “International student mobility from Russia, Eastern Europe, Caucasus and Central Asia to the UK: Trends, institutional rationale and strategies for student recruitment”, Research Report, The Centre for Comparative and International Education, University of Oxford, 46 p.

Clemens, M. (2009). “Skill flow: a fundamental reconsideration of skilled-worker mobility and development”, Working paper No. 180, Center for Global Development.

Collins, F. L., Ho, K. C., Ishikawa, M. and Ma, A. H. (2017), “International student mobility and after-study lives: the portability and prospects of overseas education in Asia”, Population, Space and Place, 23: e2029. doi: 10.1002/psp.2029.

Creighton, M. J. (2013). “The role of aspirations in domestic and international migration”, Social Science Journal, 50(1): 79-88.

Cresswell, T. (2006). On the move. London: Routledge.

Cummings, W. K. (1984). “Going overseas for higher education: the Asian experience”, in Barber, E.G., Altbach, P.G. and Myers, R.G. (Eds.): Bridges to knowledge: foreign students in comparative perspective, 130-146. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Docquier, F., Peri, G. and Ruyssen, I. (2014). “The cross-country determinants of potential and actual migration”, International Migration Review, 48(s1): S37-S99.

De Haas, H. (2010). “The internal dynamics of migration processes: a theoretical inquiry”, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 36(10): 1587-1617.

Findlay, A. M., King, R. and Stam, A. (2017). “Producing international student migration: an exploration of the role of marketization in shaping international study opportunities”, in van Riemsdijk, M. and Wang, Q. (eds.): Rethinking International Skilled Migration, 19-35. London: Routledge.

Harris, J. and Todaro, M. (1970). “Migration, Unemployment and Development: a two-sector analysis”, American Economic Review, 60(1): 126-142.

Helbich, J. and Miskovicova, A. (2017). “Existing capacity development and mobility programmes between the EU and Central Asia countries. Stock-taking Report”, European Union Programme for Central Asia, 47p.

Hicks, J. (1932). The theory of wages. London: Macmillan.

Holloway, S. L., O’Hara, S. L. and Pimlott-Wilson, H. (2012). “Eudcational mobility and the gendered geography of cultural capital: The case of international student flows between Central Asia and the UK”, Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 44(9): 2278-2294. doi: 10.1068/a44655.

Hung, K. and Petrick, J. F. (2012). “Testing the effects of congruity, travel constraints, and self-efficacy on travel intentions: an alternative decision-making model”, Tourism Management, 33: 855-867.

Ivaschenko, O. and Danzer, A. M. (2010). “Migration patterns in a remittances dependent economy: Evidence from Tajikistan during the global financial crisis”, Migration Letters, 2: 190-202.

Kagan, J. (1972). “Motives and development”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 22: 51-66.

King, R. and Sondhi, G. (2018). “International student migration: a comparison of UK and Indian students’ motivations for studying abroad”, Globalisation, Societies and Education, 16(2): 176-191. doi: 10.1080/14747724.2017.1405244.

Kritz, M. M. (2016). “Why do countries differ in their rates of outbound student mobility?”, Journal of Studies in International Education, 20(2): 99-117.

Kritz, M. M. (2011). “African international student mobility: country differences in numbers and destinations”, in Oucho, J.O. (ed.): Migration in the service of African development, 157-206. Nigeria: Safari Books LTD, Ibadan.

Kubota, R. (2016). “The social imaginary of study abroad: Complexities and contradictions”, The Language Learning Journal, 44(3): 347-357. doi: 10.1080/09571736.2016.1198098.

Kurzmann, S. (2014). “Departures from the periphery – Central Asia in times of global student mobility”, international conference paper on “Prospects of EU-Central Asia relations”, 28-29 August 2014, Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Lai, H. M., Hsiao, Y. L. and Hsieh, P. J. (2018). “The role of motivation, ability, and opportunity in university teachers’ continuance use intention for flipped teaching”, Computers and Education, 124: 34-50. doi: 10.1016/j.compedu.2018.05.013

Lee K. H. and Tan, J. P. (1984). “The international flow of third level lesser developed country students to developed countries: determinants and implications”, Higher Education, 13: 687-707.

Lowell, B. L. and Khadka, P. (2011). “Trends in foreign-student admissions to the U.S.”, in Chiswick, B.R. (ed.): High-skilled immigration in a global labor market, 83-110. Washington, D. C.: American Enterprise Institute.

MacInner, D. J. and Jaworski, B. J. (1989). “Information processing from advertisements: towards an integrative framework”, Journal of Marketing, 53(October): 1-23.

Maddux, J. A. (2005). “Self-efficacy: the power of believing you can”, in: Snyder, C. and Lopez, S. (Eds.), Handbook of Positive Psychology, Oxford University Press, New York, 227-287.

Mains, D. (2011). “Hope is cut: Youth, unemployment, and the future in urban Ethiopia”, Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Michie, S., van Stralen, M. and West, R. (2011). “The behaviour change wheel: a new method for characterizing and designing behaviour change interventions”, Implementation Science, 6: 42. doi: 10.1186/1748-5908-6-42.

Mondain, N. and Diagne, A. (2013). “Discerning the reality of ‘those left behind’ in contemporary migration processes in Sub-Saharan Africa: some theoretical reflections in the light of data from Senegal”, Journal of Intercultural Studies, 34(5): 503-516.

Murphy-Lejeune, E. (2002). Student mobility and narrative in Europe: the new strangers. London: Routledge.

Newell, S. (2012). The modernity bluff: crime, consumption, and citizenship in Côte d’Ivoire. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Ryan, R. M. and Deci, E. L. (2000). “Intrinsic and extrinsic motivations: classic definitions and new directions”, Contemporary Educational Psychology, 25: 54-67.

Shields, R. and Edwards, R. (2010). “Student mobility and emerging hubs in global higher education”, in: V. D. Rust, L. M. Portnoi, and S. S. Bagley (Eds.), Higher Education, Policy and the Global Competition Phenomenon. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Soong, H., Stahl, G. and Shan, H. (2017). “Transnational mobility through education: a Bourdieusian insight on life as middle transnationals in Australia and Canada”, Globalisation, Societies and Education, 241-253. doi: 10.1080/14767724.2017.1396886.

Syed Zwick, H. (2019). “Narrative analysis of Syrians, South Sudanese and Libyans transiting in Egypt: A MOA approach”, Munich Personal RePEc Archive, No. 93041, 19 p.

Syed Zwick, H. and Syed, S. A. S. (2015). “Students disinterest for mobility: microeconomic determinants”, Current Politics and Economics of Europe, 26(1): 93-108.

Takala, T. and Piattoeva, N. (2012). “Changing conceptions of development assistance to education in the international discourse on post-soviet countries”, International Journal of Education Development, 32: 3-10.

Teichler, U. and Jahr, V. (2001). “Mobility during the course of study and after graduation”, European Journal of Education, 36(4): 443-458.

Triandis, H. C. (1977). Interpersonal Behaviour. Monterey, C.A.: Brook/Cole.

UNESCO (2018). Global flow of tertiary-level students.

Urry, J. (2000). Society beyond societies: mobilities for the twenty-first century. London: Routledge.

Urry, J. (2007). Mobilities. Cambridge: Polity.

Van Mol, C. (2014). Erasmus student mobility as a gateway to the international labour market? In Gerhards J., Hans, S. and Carlson, S. (eds.): Globalisierung, Bildung and grenzüberschreitende Mobilität, 295-314. Springer: Berlin.

Waters, J. (2008). Education, migration, and cultural capital in the Chinese diaspora: transnational students between Hong Kong and Canada. Cambria Press: Amherst.

Welch, A. (2010). “Vietnam, Malaysia and the global knowledge system”. In: V. D. Rust, L. M. Portnoi, and S. S. Bagley (Eds.), Higher Education, Policy and the Global Competition Phenomenon. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Wilmoth, G. D. (2011). “Central Asia’s future role in international higher education”, Online report, 12 p.

World Bank (2011). Republic of Tajikistan Country Economic Memorandum. Tajikistan’s Quest for Growth: Stimulating Private Investment. Washington, DC: World Bank.