Shan Yu

Spatiotemporal dynamics of wealth inequality in China and the UK, geographical and demographic reshaping

Shan Yu is a DPhil candidate at the School of Geography and the Environment and St Antony’s College. Her academic background spans geography, urban studies, economics and management. Before joining Oxford, she completed an MPhil in Land Economy at the University of Cambridge.

Her research takes an interdisciplinary and spatial approach to understanding how economic and urban development shape social inequalities across places and populations. Drawing on quantitative analysis, large-scale datasets and spatial methods, she examines the uneven geographies of development and how social and economic processes are reflected in urban environments and household circumstances. Her research interests span urban and regional development, the built environment and public health, and housing and wealth.

Her doctoral research examines the changing geography of wealth inequality in China and the UK. By bringing geographical and demographic perspectives to the study of household wealth, she seeks to understand how inequalities evolve across different institutional and spatial contexts.

Shan has contributed to a range of national and international research projects addressing topics including urban-rural divides, housing, environmental change and social inequality. She has experience working with interdisciplinary research teams and applying quantitative and spatial methods to questions concerning cities, regions and households. At Oxford, she has worked as a teaching assistant at the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment. She also serves as a peer reviewer for more than 20 academic journals across geography, economics and public health.

The political economy of housing, wealth and inequality

• Cui, C., Yu, S., Chen, J. and Li, J. (2025) How home buyers finance their homeownership in post-reform urban China? Changing dynamics of variegated financial pathways. International Journal of Housing Policy, 25(5): 721-749.
• Wang, X., Yu, S. and Zhang, L. (2024) Liquidity constraints and speculation: Evidence from the housing-resale restriction policy in Qingdao, China. Applied Economics, 56(60): 9316-9332.
• Cui, C., Yu, S. and Huang, Y. (2023) His house, her house? Gender inequality and homeownership among married couples in urban China. Cities, 134: 104187.
• Yu, S. and Cui, C. (2021) Difference in housing finance usage and its impact on housing wealth inequality in urban China. Land, 10(12): 1404.
• Cui, J., Cui, C., Ronald, R., Yu, S. and Mu, X. (2021) The dynamics of gender in the intergenerational transmission of homeownership: A case study of young couples in Shanghai. Population Space and Place, 27(6): e2428.

Urban transformations, regional dynamics and spatial inequality

• He, S., Mei, L., Yu, S., Huang, S. and Wang, L. (2025) The impact of high-speed rail network on high-end service industry development: Evidence from the Yangtze River Delta, China. Research in Transportation Business & Management, 58: 101253.
• He, S., Yu, S. and Wang, L. (2021) The nexus of transport infrastructure and economic output in city-level China: a heterogeneous panel causality analysis. Annals of Regional Science, 66: 113-135.
• He, S., Yu, S., Li, G. and Zhang, J. (2020) Exploring the influence of urban form on land-use efficiency from a spatiotemporal heterogeneity perspective: Evidence from 336 Chinese cities. Land Use Policy, 95: 104576. (ESI Highly Cited Paper)

Urban analytics, built environments and public health

• He, S., Yu, S., Dai, J., Ai, L. and Chuang, C. (2024) The built environment, purpose-specific walking behaviour and overweight: the perspective of gender disparities. International Journal of Health Geographics, 23(1): 2.
• He, S., Zhang, Z., Yu, S., Xia, C. and Tung, C. (2024) Investigating the effects of urban morphology on vitality of community life circles using machine learning and geospatial approaches. Applied Geography, 167: 103287. (ESI Highly Cited Paper)
• He, S., Zhang, H., Yu, S., Zhang, J. Hu, X. and Huang, Z. (2024) Mapping the pulse: heterogeneous impacts of human-scale street design on urban vitality in four Chinese megacities. The Professional Geographer, 76(5): 620-63.
• He, S., Yu, S., Wei, P. and Fang, C. (2019) A spatial design network analysis of street networks and the locations of leisure entertainment activities: A case study of Wuhan, China. Sustainable Cities and Society, 44: 880-887.