Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Rossello, Giulia
Author-Email: rossello@merit.unu.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: UNU-MERIT
Author-Name: Cowan, Robin
Author-Email: cowan@merit.unu.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: UNU-MERIT
Title: Far from random? : The role of homophily in student supervision 
Abstract: This paper studies racial and gender homophily in student supervision 
	 relationships in a context of social transformations, South Africa 
	 academia. We develop a technique to separate choice homophily from that 
	 induced by the system. Comprising two permutation tests repeated at two 
	 levels of aggregation, system and departments. We find clear evidence of 
	 homophily in student supervision, along racial lines in particular. 
	 Roughly half of the observed homophily is induced by the departments 
	 composition and stays constant over time. Overall, choice homophily has 
	 similar magnitude along racial and gender dimensions. Further, we ask 
	 where choice homophily originates in the demographic groups of students 
	 and professors. We find that white (male) students have high tendency to 
	 form same-type relations, while among professors it is black (female) 
	 who display the higher frequency. Group differences show that choice 
	 homophily is likely to originate from students in the former majority. 
Classification-JEL: A14, D71, D85, I23, I24, J15, J16
Keywords: Academia, South Africa, Student supervision, Network Analysis, Induced
	 homophily, Choice homophily, Segregation, Assortativity mixing,
	 Permutation test, Social Transformations, Social Change, System of
	 Organisations, Institutional constraints, Gender ties, Racial ties, 
	 University System, emerging countries, Racial and Gender Homophily 
Series: UNU-MERIT Working Papers
Creation-Date: 20190701
Number: 2019-024
File-URL: https://unu-merit.nl/publications/wppdf/2019/wp2019-024.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
File-Size: 275 Kb
Handle: RePEc:unm:unumer:2019024