Interwoven Lives: Parents, Marriage, and Guanxi in China

Riley, Nancy E.

doi:10.2307/353592

Cited by 85 publications

(65 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…This would undoubtedly fall on women"s shoulder (Zhan and Montgomery 2003). Although nowadays parents seldom exert absolute control over their children"s marriage, they continue to play a big role in their children"s mate choices (Pimentel 2000;Riley 1994). It may be in the best interest of parents who have their sons to marry a woman who can take on the familial responsibilities or who have their daughters to find a husband with the best possible socioeconomic status.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Their influence is twofold. Indirectly, they socialize their children about gender roles and mate choices well before their children are ready for marriage (Riley 1994). Directly, they often disapprove their children"s inclinations to form nontraditional marriages, in which the wife is older than the husband or the husband has less schooling than the wife.…”

Section: Urban Context In China and Family Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Unlike Western cultures, China has long-standing, strong, intergenerational family ties. Although arranged marriages are banned in China, parents remain actively involved in their children"s choice of mate (Riley 1994;Xu and Whyte 1990). Parents attempt to ensure that their children meet, date, and marry the "right" person.…”

Section: Urban Context In China and Family Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The gender divide in urban China: Singlehood and assortative mating by age and education

Qian¹,

Qian²

2014

DemRes

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OBJECTIVEChinese media labels highly educated, urban women who are still single in their late 20s as "leftover ladies." We investigate whether indeed highly educated women are less likely to marry than their less-educated counterparts, and how assortative mating patterns by age and education play a role in singleness. METHODSWe use data from the urban samples of the Chinese General Social Surveys in the 2000s. In the analysis we calculate marriage rates to examine the likelihood of entry into marriage, and then apply log-linear models to investigate the assortative mating patterns by age and education. RESULTSWe find that as education increases, the likelihood of marriage increases among men but decreases among women, especially among those over age 30. The results from loglinear models reveal that more marriages involve better-educated, older men and lesseducated, younger women. CONCLUSIONSWe argue that persistent traditional gender roles, accompanied by the rapid rise in women"s education, contribute to low marriage rates among older, highly educated women.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Urban Context In China and Family Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Urban Context In China and Family Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The gender divide in urban China: Singlehood and assortative mating by age and education

Qian¹,

Qian²

2014

DemRes

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“…In most cultures and throughout history, parents have controlled the mate choice of their offspring to a considerable extent (e.g., Apostolou, 2007;2010;Buunk, Park, & Duncan, 2010). Currently, severe parental control of mate choice -to the extent that parents chose a mate for their offspring without much influence of the young prospective couple -is still a widespread practice in many Asian and North African countries, including India and Pakistan, and also in those countries where the immigrants examined in the present research came from, i.e., Turkey and Morocco (e.g., Applbaum, 1995;Mitchell, 1970;Riley, 1994;Xie & Combs, 1996). Parental control of the mate choice of one´s offspring may continue for several generations among immigrants in Western countries.…”

Section: The Role Of Parental Control and Religiositymentioning

confidence: 99%

All in the family: Attitudes towards cousin marriages among young dutch people from various ethnic groups

Buunk

2017

EMB

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This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons AttributionNonCommercial 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium for non-commercial purposes, provided the original author and source are credited, a link to the CC License is provided, and changes -if any -are indicated.© Abstract. The present research examined attitudes towards cousin marriages among young people from various ethnic groups living in The Netherlands. The sample consisted of 245 participants, with a mean age of 21, and included 107 Dutch, 69 Moroccans, and 69 Turks. The parents of the latter two groups came from countries where cousin marriages are accepted. Participants reported more negative than positive attitudes towards cousin marriage, and women reported more negative attitudes than did men. The main objection against marrying a cousin was that it is wrong for religious reasons, whereas the risk of genetic defects was considered less important. Moroccans had less negative attitudes than both the Dutch and the Turks, who did not differ from each other. Among Turks as well as among Moroccans, a more positive attitude towards cousin marriage was predicted independently by a preference for parental control of mate choice and religiosity. This was not the case among the Dutch. Discussion focuses upon the differences between Turks and Moroccans, on the role of parental control of mate choice and religiosity, and on the role of incest avoidance underlying attitudes towards cousin marriage.

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“…Parents, however, made different allocations, compromising more on traits such as beauty to get more of other traits such as a good family and a similar religious background. These traits may help parents to increase their own social status (Ertem & Kocturk, 2008;Riley, 1994;Shadle, 2003), in order to ensure that their grandchildren are socialized in a culturally appropriate manner and they will receive care in old age (Dubbs, Buunk, & Taniguchi, 2013;Riley, 1994). Overall, beauty in a prospective mate is beneficial to both children and their parents, but it is more beneficial to the former than to the latter.…”

Section: Parent-offspring Conflict Over Matingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Parent–Offspring Conflict Over Mating

Apostolou

2015

Evol Psychol

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Evolutionary reasoning indicates that certain traits are more beneficial when they are found in a mate than in a son-or a daughterin-law, while other traits are more beneficial when they are found in a son-or a daughter-in-law than in a mate. This translates into different evolutionary pressures exercised on in-law and mate preferences driving them to diverge. The purpose of this research is to identify the domains over which in-law and mate choice is exercised, and following this, to identify the areas of agreement and disagreement in these domains. In particular, using an extensive sample of parents (N ¼ 1,717), Study 1 identifies 10 domains over which mate and in-law choice is exercised. Study 2 employs a sample of families (N ¼ 541) in order to compare the preferences of parents with the preferences of their children. It is found that in-law and mate preferences diverge over several domains including good looks, personality, and family background.

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Interwoven Lives: Parents, Marriage, and Guanxi in China

Cited by 85 publications

References 24 publications

The gender divide in urban China: Singlehood and assortative mating by age and education

The gender divide in urban China: Singlehood and assortative mating by age and education

All in the family: Attitudes towards cousin marriages among young dutch people from various ethnic groups

Parent–Offspring Conflict Over Mating

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