What Are the Important Factors Influencing the Recruitment and Retention of Doctoral Students in a Public Health Setting? A Discrete Choice Experiment Survey in China.

Our study suggests that monthly income and employment location were valued most by doctoral SMHCM students when choosing a job. A more effective human resource policy intervention to attract doctoral SMHCM students to work in CDCs, especially CDCs in third-tier cities should consider both the incentives provided by the job characteristics and the background of students. Doctoral students are at the stages of career preparation, so the results of this study would be informative for policymakers and help them to design the recruitment and retention policies for CDCs.