I am an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Hong Kong. I joined HKU in 2019, jointly appointed by the Department of Sociology, Department of Geography and the Faculty of Arts (China Studies). Previously, I was a Research Assistant Professor of Social Science and a Junior Fellow of Institute for Advanced Study at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (2017-2019).

In 2017, I received my PhD in Social Science from HKUST, where I was also trained at the Center for Applied Social and Economic Research (CASER). I completed my MPhil in Social Science at HKUST in 2013 and BA in Sociology at Shandong University in 2011.

I am a stratification researcher and social demographer who studies urban inequalities. My research agenda is situated at the intersection of sociology of education, sociology of work, and urban sociology, with a substantive focus on child development and youth employment issues in urban China. In most of my research, I draw on various longitudinal survey datasets and a wide range of quantitative methods for causal inference, and have recently incorporated computational, experimental and GIS approaches.

In particular, I am interested in understanding:

• the impacts of various family, school and neighborhood factors on children’s educational and developmental outcomes;
• young people’s experiences of school-to-work transition, precarious employment and skills mismatch;
• socio-spatial factors (e.g. migration, segregation, location) that shape urban residents’ attitudes, well-being, and life chances.

Currently, I am working to expand upon my three main lines of research described above by undertaking the following new initiatives:

• Of Jobs and Men: An AI-assisted Approach for Studying Skills Mismatch in Hong Kong.
• Unravelling Urban Malaise: The Impact of Activity Spaces on Subjective Well-being in China’s Metropolises.
• Early Childhood Development in Hong Kong: A Longitudinal Study (funded by RGC-CRF).
• Educational Expansion, College Premium and Social Mobility: A Comparative Study of Hong Kong and Taiwan Youth (funded by RGC-ECS).
• Socioeconomic Segregation, School Choice, and Geography of EducationalInequality in Hong Kong (funded by RGC-GRF).