‘Class and Gender as predictors of study abroad participation among US liberal arts college Students’

ABSTRACT

This paper explores one of the enduring small mysteries of student life – why do women participate in study abroad programs more than men? To answer this question, original data collected from seniors and recent graduates of a sample of liberal arts colleges in the US were analyzed. Results show an intractable gender gap persisting, even after common explanatory factors are explored, although these factors also point to the problem as one of gender and class, not gender per se. It concludes with a discussion of the meaning of cultural enrichment and venturing away from home for elite college women (elite women’s venture capital), and a call for future studies that pay attention to the ways race, gender, and class intersect to produce particular meanings of study abroad participation.

KEYWORDS:

• Study abroad
• gender
• class
• cultural capital
• program choice

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

ORCID

Allison L. Hurst http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5221-798X

Notes

1 In the eight-category intersectional variable, elite white women and elite non-white women had statistically similar participation rates but elite non-white men participated at much lower rates than elite white men and non-elite white women participated at much higher rates than non-elite non-white women.