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But it maybe even harder for them to find a job back home.
"One of the examples in my book is a young man named Deng Kun. He is a college graduate who majored in biological engineering. He told me that he could not go back to his hometown where people don't even understand what his major is. They thought he learned about how to raise cattle."
Lian's opinion is echoed by other experts.
Wen Tiejun, a researcher at the Beijing-based Renmin University, says the ant tribe phenomenon is caused by the imbalanced development between large and small cities.
"Over the past several decades of development, we have seen little investment flow into medium-sized and small cities. With insufficient investment, few job opportunities suitable for graduates are available in small cities. So college graduates tend to flock to big cities to try their luck."
The glut of college graduates is another reason why ant tribes have formed.
China began expanding university enrollment in the late 1990s to meet growing personnel demands, leading to a surge of graduates over the past decade. More than 6 million students graduated last year, about half a million more than in 2008.
Li Chunling, a socialist from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, says when most university administrators decided to expand enrollment, they failed to consider market demand while setting up different majors.
"We are certainly seeing a surging number of college graduates suddenly appearing in the job market, because Chinese universities expanded enrollment in just a short period of time. However after enrollment, there was a lack of instruction on the campus to teach new graduates how to correctly adapt to the job market and how to properly choose and apply for a job."
Besides a shortage of job opportunities, Li Chunling says that he believes high social expectations for college graduates are another reason behind the proliferation of ant tribes.
Three decades ago, when many Chinese cities embarked on their development booms, the workforce favored university degree-holders over traditional state-run factory workers.
But with the generalization of higher education, Li Chunling says the value of a college diploma is dropping, while most people are still reluctant to accept the fact.
