农村家庭高等教育投资决策研究

【摘要】在知识经济时代,科技和教育越来越成为推动经济发展的主要因素。

科技创新、人才培养的根本在于大力发展高等教育。

进入21世纪,我国高等教育经过扩招得到空前大发展,高等教育经费分担制度开始实施,家庭投资高等教育热情高涨,家庭投资已经成为高等教育发展必不可少的重要推动力量。

但同时,由高校扩招和就业结构失衡所导致的大学生就业难预示着高等教育投资风险开始逐步显现,家庭高等教育投资中非理性现象逐渐增多。

在这样的背景下,农村家庭高等教育投资决策的现状是什么、如何引导农村家庭理性开展高等教育投资、如何避免高等教育投资风险、提高高等教育投资收益率、国家应如何通过政策设计引导家庭的理性投资等,是当前值得研究的问题。

本文转换了传统经济学研究范式,以近30年来得到迅猛发展的行为经济学主要理论为指导,在决策者“有限理性”、高等教育投资包含投资风险的前提假设下,借助理论分析、经济实验、问卷调查等研究方法,阐述了农村家庭高等教育投资决策的现实环境;分析了造成决策主体有限理性的内在原因,并通过城乡比较把握农村家庭高等教育投资决策者有限理性的实现程度;认真考察了农村家庭高等教育投资决策的特点和过程,对两个重要决策点进行了实证分析;采用结构方程建模方法探索影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策的因素,解析了决策者启发式策略和心理会计影响高等教育投资决策的机制;从行为经济学视角解读了农村家庭高等教育投资决策过程中出现的过度教育投资、忽视风险等异常现象;还原出一个真实的农村家庭高等教育投资决策者,给正在或者即将进行高等教育投资的农村家庭提供风险警示、决策参考和投资指导,对国家制定引导家庭高等教育投资政策提供意见和建议。

本文共包括八章。

第一章导论。

在对农村家庭高等教育投资的国际国内背景和现状加以分析的基础上,阐明研究的目的和意义,并提出研究问题和方法。

第二章对研究的理论基础等进行简要的介绍和评价。

介绍了行为经济学中重要的前景理论、心理会计理论的主要内容以及决策过程中可能出现的启发式和偏误,说明了行为经济学相关理论对于农村家庭高等教育投资决策研究的指导意义,为后续研究打下理论基础。

第三章对影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策行为的社会环境进行了剖析。

高等教育的快速发展提供了更多投资机会;农民收入的增加提高了投资能力;高校收费制度改革加重了投资负担;大学生就业难降低了投资收益预期。

第四章在对传统经济学“完全理性”假设进行批判的基础上,对不确定条件下决策主体“有限理性”的概念和发展加以简要回顾,剖析决策者有限理性的内在心理原因,提出有限理性可以按照决策者主动性的不同分为两类,即“理性不能有限理性”和“理性不为有限理性”。

进一步,通过城乡比较得出农村家庭高等教育投资决策者有限理性的实现程度处于较低水平的结论。

第五章首先对家庭教育投资的特殊性进行了分析,建立了投资决策过程理论模型;接着,分别从行为经济学视角对农村家庭高等教育投资决策过程中是否投资、投资给谁的问题进行分析,对农村家庭高等教育投资决策过程进行整体把握。

研究表明,农村家庭具有强烈的高等教育投资意愿,而且决策时不进行投资的成本收益分析;在选择投资对象的过程中,作为有限理性决策者的农村家长一般不用“高等教育投资的成本和收益比较”方法作为决策依据,而是通过采用“选择最好成绩启发式”来做出投资决策;决策者的有限理性并没有导致决策质量的下降。

第六章首先分析了结构方程建模方法的优缺点及其在家庭教育投资决策研究中的适用性,然后运用结构方程建模方法探讨影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策的各种因素及其之间的关系。

通过创造性地将感知风险、感知成本和感知收益作为影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策的影响因素纳入模型发现:基于实际成本的感知成本并不对家庭教育投资决策产生影响,实际风险通过决策者的感知风险影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策,预期收益和子女意愿是影响农村家庭高等教育投资决策的重要因素;代表性启发式和易得性启发式影响农村家庭的高等教育投资决策;农村家庭决策者也存在心理会计现象,但是心理会计结构简单,心理预算性特点不明显,表明在家庭收入和信贷约束情况下,心理账户有合并简化的倾向。

第七章对农村家庭高等教育投资决策过程中的异常现象加以分析。

农村家庭存在着高等教育过度投资的强烈愿望,避免更大的后悔是其主要原因;家庭决策者的过度自信和对“主要考虑方面”的重视导致农村家庭忽视高等教育投资风险。

第八章对本研究的基本结论进行总结说明,并提出相应的政策建议和指导意见。

应当综合采取措施为农村家庭提供良好的高等教育投资决策环境;提高农村家庭决策者的教育水平;重视和鼓励农村家庭高等教育投资决策心理与行为的研究;加强信息化建设,做好政策宣传、信息公开等工作,为家庭教育投资实现理性决策提供相对充分的信息;鼓励相关机构提供专业的投资决策咨询服务;农村家庭投资者应当通过广泛搜集信息、加强学习提高自身决策水平。

?【Abstract】 In the era of knowledge economy, science, technology and education are the main force to promote economic development. The development of higher education has become the basic of Sci-tech innovation and the training of personnel. In the 21st century, China's higher education has made an unprecedented large-scale development through increased enrollment, the share system of higher education funding. Families are becoming more enthusiastic to invest on higher education, and the family investment has been essential for the development of higher education of our country. But at the same time, the investment risks of higher education have risen gradually, apparently caused by the increasing enrollment and unbalancing employment structure, which made it difficult for university students to find a job. The irrational investments of higher education have increased gradually. In this context, what is the status of the rural household decision-making on higher education investment, how to guide rural household to invest rationally on higher education, how to avoid investment risks and improve investment yields of higher education, how the state design policies to guide the family investment on higher education, is the issues worth studying.This paper conversed the research paradigm of the traditional economics, taking the major theories of the Behavioral Economics as a guide, which get the rapid development in the past 30 years. Under the hypothesis of decision-maker’s“bounded rationality”and higher education investment is risking, this paper elaborated the rural household’s higher education investment decision environment, analysis the reason why the decision-maker has“bounded rationality”, how far can the“bounded rationality”go, inspected the characteristics and the process of rural households’higher education investment decision-making, analysis the two important points in process carefully. We do this by theoretical analysis, economic experiments, survey and other research methods. Through comparison of urban and rural household to find the degree of bounded rational investment decision-makers of rural household achieve; Then, using structural equation modeling to explore the factors which affects the decision-making on higher education investment of rural household, and on this basis, giving some research on when the higher education investment begins, how to determine the beneficiaries of the investment, how the mental accounting affect the decision-making process of rural household, why there is some abnormal phenomenon such as over-confidence and neglecting risk, from a perspective of Behavioral Economics. And this will give a real decision-maker of higher education investment. At the last, we provide some risk alerts, references of decision-making and investment guides. We suggest that the government should give higher education investment policy, provide advice and recommendations to guide the rural household to invest correctly.This dissertation includes 8 chapters.Chapter 1 Introduction. Gives the purpose, topic, and methods of this research.Chapter 2 gives the simple introduceand evaluation to the basis theory of the research. It includes the main contents of Behavioral Economics, the Prospect Theory, the Mental Accounting Theory and the Heuristic and Bias. Give the meaning of the theory to higher education investment decision-making of rural household.In Chapter 3, this paper analysis the social environment which affecting the higher education investment decision-making of the rural household. The rapid development of higher education has provided more opportunities for investment. The increasing of farmers' income improved their investment ability; The reform of university charge system has aggravated the burden of investor; The difficulty of university student to get employed reduce their prospected investment yield.Chapter 4 is about the rationality of the decision maker. It criticized the“entirely rationality”hypothesis of the traditional economics first, and then gives a brief review to the concept and development of“bounded rationality”, analysis to the internal reason of decision-makers’“bounded rationality”. According to their initiativeness, the bounded rationality of decision-makers can be divided into two categories, one is“bounded rationality of can’t”and the other“bounded rationality of don’t”. Further more, through the comparison of urban and rural families we find that the degree of the rationality of rural higher education investment decision-makers is at a relatively low level.In Chapter 5, we carried on the analysis the particularity of the household education investment's first, build up a theoretical model of investment decision-making procession. And then we analysis the special nature of the households’investment on higher education. After that, from the perspective of behavioral economics, we analysis the three stages of higher education investment decision-making process: whether the household invest, invest to whom, how to invest. Research shows that rural household has a strong intention to invest on higher education, and did not give an analysis of the costs and benefits of investment on higher education in the decision-making process. In the process of choosing of whom will be invested, the bounded rational parents often take“choosing the best heuristic”, and they general focus only on their children's academic performance, and do not compare differences in the cost and benefits carefully. This did not decline the quality of rural families’higher education investment decision. There is mental accounting in the process of decision-making of rural households’investment on higher education, but the mental accounting of them has simple structure. When the household face the state of constrained family income and credit circumstances, the mental accounting will not happen sometimes.Chapter 6, we give the advantages and disadvantages of the structural equation modeling (SEM)methods, and its usefulness of it in the research of households’investment decision-making of higher education, and then using SEM to find all the various factors which will affect the rural households’higher education investment decisions and the relationship between them. We find that, perceived cost based on the real cost does not affect the decision-making; perceived risks, the willing of the children and perceived perception will affect rural households’investment decision-making on higher education. The Representation Heuristic and Availability Heuristic influence the decision-making of rural households’higher education investment; The rural household decision-maker also has mental accounting phenomenon, but the structureof their mental accounts is simple, the psychological budget characteristic is not obvious, indicated that in the restraint situation of household income and credit, the psychological accounts has the tendency to merge and simplify.In Chapter 7, this paper analyzed the abnormal phenomenon in the process of rural households’higher education investment decision-making. The rural household has the strong aspiration to invest in the higher education, and the avoiding of the bigger regrets is the primary cause. The family decision-maker’s over-confidence and paying more attention to“the main consideration aspect”can cause to the neglecting of higher education investment risk.Chapter 8 gives the basic conclusions of this study, summed up the note and the corresponding policy advice and guidance. Synthesize measures must be taken to provide a good environment for the rural household to make higher education investment decision; Raises their educational level; Encourage and pay more attention to the study of higher education investment decision-making. And some relevant departments should strengthen information construction, make policy advocacy, disclose information, to construct an relatively plenary decision-making environment in order to make household achieve a rational investment decision-making; The government also should encourage the relevant agencies to provide professional advisory services to the investment decision-making; Rural household investors should strengthen their learning, collect plenty of information to improve their level of rationality in decision-making procession。