Autonomy and responsibility: Women’s life and career choices in urban Japan

The marital and fertility sentiment orientation of Chinese women and its influencing factors – An analysis based on natural language processing

“…Based on sentiment evaluation of the comments on these six Weibo hot topics separately, we found that the majority of comments related to the following topics were negative: "The Marriage and Fertility Dilemma of Contemporary Young Women," "Tendency of Some Young Women Towards Non-Marriage and Non-Childbearing," and "Prohibition on Inquiring about Women's Marriage and Fertility in Job Interviews". First, concerning the difficulties faced by contemporary women in marriage and fertility, such negative sentiment may stem from societal expectations and pressure placed on women, whose primary roles are seen to relate to marriage and fertility, which may limit their pursuit of career and personal development [44][45][46]. Such negative sentiment is exemplified by comments such as "It's like binding women's feet again (foot binding was a cruel traditional practice in ancient China that involved tightly binding women's feet to achieve a small and delicate foot shape, causing longterm physical and psychological harm to women.…”

“…Additionally, exorbitant housing prices contribute to fear surrounding marriage and fertility [58,59]. Shifting values regarding marriage and fertility may be influenced by modern societal notions, with women placing greater emphasis on personal desires and autonomous choices, leading to scepticism about and resistance to traditional views on marriage and fertility [60,61]. Last, the influence of family and social cultural beliefs can result in women's assuming a greater burden of household chores and childcare responsibilities, preventing the equal division of labour and support [62,63] and thereby generating negative emotions.…”