Zhenjie Yuan’s research while affiliated with Guangzhou University and other places

Spatial accessibility is an essential manifestation of social equity and spatial planning. However, when examining spatial accessibility, systematic review studies dominate the literature, with fewer studies employing evaluative and relational bibliometric approaches. Thus, to provide a comprehensive overview of spatial accessibility research from 1999 to 2022, the works of literature referenced and analyzed by the Web of Science during 1999–2022 were analyzed: bibliometrics and scientific mapping methods using R software, the biblioshiny web program, tidyverse (ggplot2), and VOSviewer. The analysis results indicate a significant increase in the number of research papers addressing spatial accessibility throughout the research period accompanied by a continuous expansion of the research area. Collaboration and research endeavors among countries in this domain have deepened, leading to a continual improvement in the quality of papers. In addition, influential journals, authors, and articles in the field of spatial accessibility were also counted. New data, methods, and technology will become substantially more critical in accessibility research.

Previous studies on Chinese overseas students have generally presumed a smooth transition from mobility to mobility capital and have lacked an ethnic perspective. In this study, we adopt mobility capital as an analytical lens to explore the life trajectories of a group of Tibetans with studying abroad experiences. Drawing on qualitative data through multiple methods, we find a shift from collective-oriented expectations regarding studying abroad to individualist life planning and lifestyles after returning to work in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR). Before studying abroad, the informants viewed such experiences as important capital that could be later used to make a change for the Tibetan group, their local societies, and the state. Those views met a different reality after returning to TAR because the informants generally felt they were being viewed as potentially risk subjects in the workplace, which significantly impeded the capitalization of educational mobility at the institutional level. However, the informants developed coping strategies to find self-worth in private life by capitalizing on educational mobility. By addressing the subjective experiences of Tibetan informants in TAR and their associations with institutional contexts, this article not only engages an ethnicity-sensitive perspective to understand the politics of international educational mobility but also extends the discussion on individuals’ experiences of educational mobility to the successional stage upon returning to their home societies. This article ultimately emphasizes the need for more culturally and politically reflexive policies that can sustain the flow of ethnic talents and help them realize their self-worth.

Characteristics of the urban environment (e.g., building density and road network) can influence the spread and transmission of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) within cities, especially in high-density high-rise built environments. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the key attributes of high-density high-rise built environments to enhance modelling of the spread of COVID-19. To this end, case studies for testing attributes for modelling development were performed in two densely populated Chinese cities with high-rise, high-density built environments (Hong Kong and Shanghai). The investigated urban environmental features included 2D and 3D urban morphological indices (e.g., sky view factor, floor area ratio, frontal area density, height to width ratio, and building coverage ratio), socioeconomic and demographic attributes (e.g., population), and public service points-of-interest (e.g., bus stations and clinics). The modelling effects of 3D urban morphological features on the infection rate are notable in urban communities. As the spatial scale becomes larger, the modelling effect of 2D built environment factors (e.g., building coverage ratio) on the infection rate becomes more notable. The influence of several key factors (e.g., the building coverage ratio and population density) at different scales can be considered when modelling the infection risk in urban communities. The findings of this study clarify how attributes of built environments can be applied to predict the spread of infectious diseases. This knowledge can be used to develop effective planning strategies to prevent and control epidemics and ensure healthy cities.

While studies on students’ ethnic identity, national identity and social mobility gained relatively good research development in Western societies, little attention has been given to other social contexts, particularly non-Western societies like China. A questionnaire (N = 570, aged 14 to 20) was conducted in a Xinjiang Class school in Southern China to examine the nexus of students’ ethnic identity, national identity and perception on social mobility. The Xinjiang Class is currently one of the most iconic preferential educational policies recruiting students from ethnic groups in Xinjiang (an ethnic minority-concentrated border region) and offering them senior secondary education in select Han-centric, senior-secondary schools in China’s central and east coast provinces. The results demonstrate that the strengthening effect of students’ ethnic identity on national identity is not obvious; students’ strong national identity contributes to their positive perception on upward social mobility. However, the widely accepted viewpoint that students’ ethnic identity has a negative influence on perception of social mobility cannot be fully supported in this case. This study enriches the extant literature by providing a combined model to explore the nuanced mechanisms between ethnic identity, national identity and students’ perception on social mobility in a multi-ethnic society and by helping to unveil the identity politics unfolded in current China’s educational sector.

This paper explores the complexities behind the educational decisions of Tibetan parents on sending their children to the interior cities for dislocated secondary education. Drawing on qualitative data through multiple methods, we find that their educational decisions are driven both by a rational calculation of the benefits and costs and by a moralised ideology of good parenting. Educational opportunities are prioritised over ethnic cultural learning in parents’ decisions. However, parents hope their children will make up for this loss at a later life stage, at college and work. Parents’ temporary compromises reflect their positioning of priorities at different life stages. This study offers a new lens to understand the politics of dislocated schooling in China from ethnic minority parents’ perspective.

Technology issued an official Opinion discouraging the use of the Science Citation Index (SCI) as a framework for the assessment of research performance. There is a need to assess the origin of the new policy, and how it will reshape cultures and practices of scientific knowledge production in China. We suggest that while concerns over the quality of research and conduct of scientists are at play, a deeper reason underlying the government's adoption of a more cautious stance towards SCI is wider social controversy around what system of research assessment is best suited to social development and well-being in China. However, failing to continue to engage in international publication and collaboration would be self-defeating for China. We propose three recommendations for reforming scientific evaluation in China: diversity of criteria , autonomy of scientific evaluation, and quality of peer-review.

The Xinjiang Interior Class is one of the most influential but controversial ethnic minority-focused educational policies in contemporary China. The policy recruits ethnic minority youth from their northwest homeland and offers them senior secondary education in eastern and central parts of the country. The literature on the policy is flourishing, yet little attention has been paid to spatial contexts outside of school that also significantly contribute to the interethnic politics of the policy. Drawing on interviews (N=16), participant observations, and questionnaire surveys (N=97) with Uyghur students on a train which took them to their new educational world, this article examines what the students felt, thought, perceived and did during the trip, and analyses how these subjective experiences are related to the process of being mobile. This article finds that the train space is a physical space of mobility, but also an affective space, entailing students’ intensive subjectivity experiences: a conflicting sense of eliteness, reinforced sense of self-discipline, and increased place identity to Xinjiang. The article supplements the current literature by presenting the poetics and politics of subjectivity among Uyghur students in a mobile space, further reinforcing the significance of mobility theories in understanding ethnic migration and its politics in China.