Graduate views on access to higher education: is it really a case of pulling up the ladder?

Webb, Rob, Watson, Duncan, Cook, Steve and Arico, Fabio (2017) Graduate views on access to higher education: is it really a case of pulling up the ladder? Studies in Higher Education, 42 (3). pp. 504-518. ISSN 0307-5079

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Abstract

Using as a starting point the recent work of Mountford-Zimdars, Jones, Sullivan and Heath (2013), we analyse attitudes towards expanding HE opportunities in the UK. We propose that the approach of Mountford-Zimdars et al. is flawed not only in its adoption of a multivariate logistic regression but in its interpretation of results. We make a number of adaptations, chief among them the use of an ordered probit approach and the addition of a time dimension to test for changes in attitudes between 2000 and 2010. We find attitudes towards HE expansion have intensified during the decade 2000-2010, but we uncover no evidence that this is due to graduates wanting to ‘pull up the ladder’, as suggested by Mountford-Zimdars et al. We argue that evidence of a widespread desire to reduce access to HE can most likely be explained by social congestion theory, internal institutional disaffection and rising tuition fees.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	higher education,expansion,widening access,attitudes,ordered probit
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Social Sciences > School of Economics
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Research Groups > Research in Mathematics Education
Depositing User:	Pure Connector
Date Deposited:	28 Jan 2016 13:06
Last Modified:	21 Oct 2022 01:03
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/56840
DOI:	10.1080/03075079.2015.1052738

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