Mapping Educational Trajectories: An Investigation of Racial and Gender-Based Differences in College Major Choice

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 11:40 am Four Seasons Ballroom 2-3
  In Roundtable Session: Gender and Racial Disparities in Educational Aspirations, Choices, and Trajectories (Table 12)

Abstract

Research on racial and gender-based differences in college major choice, particularly within an intersectional framework, is limited. Studies on postsecondary education have not explored cultural capital as an explanatory variable for these differences and have focused solely on STEM-based disparities. Drawing from Bourdieu’s and Lareau’s conception of parental cultivation and activation of cultural capital, this paper employs a QuantCrit framework to examine racial and gender-based differences in college major choice. This study finds that racial differences in college major choice are mostly insignificant, and gender-based differences are largest when comparing “quantitative”/“lucrative” majors to others. Additionally, although measures of cultural capital vary significantly by race and gender, they fail to explain the differences in college major choice.

Author

• Arti Anand, Metis Associates, Inc.