Kenneth J. Arrow, James Bryant Conant University Professor and Nobel Laureate, will leave Harvard in the fall of 1979 to join the Stanford University economics department as joint professor of economics and operation research. Research.

Arrow, who left Stanford in 1968 to come to Harvard, said yesterday he is leaving mainly because his family likes California better than Boston.

Arrow is currently one of eight University Professor at Harvard. The highly prestigious post allows professors to teach in any department they wish without being bound by departmental guidelines.

Dwight H. Perkins, chairman of the Economics Department, said yesterday he could not recall any University Professor ever leaving Harvard for another college.

Arrow received a Nobel Prize in 1972 for his work in General Equilibrium Theory and the Concept of Social Choice.

Arrow said he originally came to Harvard from Stanford because the "Stanford University administration did not allow the economics department to grow in size and I didn't think we'd be getting many good people into the department."

Deep Love

Perkins said the department was sorry to lose Arrow but that it was a personal decision based on his deep love for the California area and the close friends he left behind there.

Perkins said although Stanford has one of the top departments in the country he felt that Arrow did not make that a "primary consideration" in his decision to leave Harvard.

James N. Rosse, economics professor at Stanford University, said yesterday the department is very excited about Arrow's return to Stanford because Arrow is a "highly respected theorist as well as an important graduate and undergraduate teacher."

Diversity

Arrow's appointment as University Professor allowed him to branch out of the Economics Department and join the Committee on Applied Mathematics and the Committee on International Studies.

Arrow said his Nobel work concerned the application of mathematical methods to economics and politics.

"The General Equilibrium Theory is an attempt to analyze the interconnectedness of the economy and the way in which the various markets interact," he said.