Ethnic minority students’ self-formation strategies in navigating sociocultural challenges in higher education: a scoping review

Sociocultural diversity in higher education plays a significant role in harnessing equitable and enriching learning experiences for all students. This scoping review adopts a self-formation model to examine how ethnic minority students navigate sociocultural challenges in Hong Kong higher education. Self-formation emphasises the importance of cultural hybridity and capital conversion as ways of resisting structural exclusion. By reviewing 17 studies in Hong Kong higher education, this review identified three key self-formation strategies that ethnic minority students employed: identity capital and cultural hybridity, social capital formation and network development, and language and academic integration. While existing HE research overlooks interpretation towards structural obstacles and adaptive difficulties facing ethnic minority students under mainstream cultural narratives, we conclude that individuals may constantly engage in education and society through reflexive thinking, emphasising students’ self-formation as active agents under structural pressures, which are obstacles pushing students to re-evaluate their resources and act with greater agency. The implications suggest the uptake of institutional support models informed by culturally relevant and inclusive practices. Future research can explore specific mentorship programmes that both enhance cultural engagement and develop academic agency of ethnic minority students.