Research Purpose.
Regardless of where they are born and raised, women and girls should pursue the lives they want. It is hoped that this can be achieved as a vision.
Research Question.
How can the social environment, an essential factor behind the influence of female consciousness, break down the old barriers and create the establishment and reshaping of a new social culture?
Numerous domestic and international studies have shown that in the special gender relationship of couples, women’s and men’s perceptions of gender roles can significantly affect the equal distribution of domestic work and household power between the couple, which in turn affects the satisfaction and stability the marriage.
Because of the repressive social environment resulting in lower female consciousness, then in the last decade, gender roles and perceptions have changed. Have Chinese people’s perceptions of gender role division become more modernized between 2010-2020? Is the ideal gender-equal society closer to us?
Research Background.
Gender perceptions, fully known as gender-role attitudes, are people’s attitudes and perceptions toward gender-related social norms and social role division, reflecting the degree of gender equality in society.
Studies on the changes in Chinese gender perceptions have been conducted.
A study by Yang Juhua et al. combining data from three phases of the Chinese Women’s Social Status Survey found that Chinese people’s gender division of labor concepts such as “male outside and female inside” and “male dominant and female subordinate” tended to return to tradition. In contrast, cultural regulations such as children’s surnames and property inheritance gradually tended to be equal 1.
Yunzhu Jia and Dongling Ma also studied the changing status of Chinese urban women’s perceptions of the gender division of labor as “male heads the household and female heads the household” from multiple perspectives, including age and generation, using data from three phases of the Chinese Women’s Social Status Survey 2.
Using data from the Third World Values Survey in 1995, 2001, and 2007, Shu et al. found significant intergenerational and period differences in Chinese perceptions about gender equality. However, perceptions about the division of labor between men and women have not changed significantly over time 3.
Gu Hui instead explored the reasons for the return of gender perceptions to tradition in recent years from the macro perspective of state systems and market transformation 4.
On the other hand, in studying the heterogeneity of gender perception changes, the following results were obtained by analyzing descriptive statistics on the trends of gender perception changes in different populations differentiated by ‘generation,’ ‘gender,’ ‘urban-rural, ‘education level,’ and ‘occupation.’
The trends of change are the same: gender perceptions of all groups are returning to tradition.
Different rates of change: the rate of return to traditional gender attitudes –
a. Younger generations are faster than older generations
b. Females are faster than males
c. Rural residents are faster than urban residents (some rural residents move to cities, so this difference in speed of change may be underestimated)
d. more educated people are faster than less educated people (some of the less educated people have upgraded their education, so this difference in the rate of change may be overestimated)
Conclusion.
In China, the phenomenon of “a natural shift from traditional to modern perceptions of gender roles in the modernization process of society” predicted by modernization theory has not occurred as expected. There is a clear tendency for Chinese people to return to traditional gender concepts. This trend stems mainly from cohort change, i.e., significant regression in the gender perceptions of the same cohort of Chinese people over ten years; this regression is partially compensated by a generational turnover effect, i.e., an increase in the proportion of younger generations in the sample with more modern gender perceptions, resulting in a more modern gender perception in the sample as a whole. However, the exact generational change is the dominant force in determining the direction of gender perception change.
The tendency of gender perceptions to return to tradition is not a specific phenomenon limited to one population group but a general phenomenon applicable to all groups. However, there is heterogeneity in the rate of change. Multiple regression analysis shows that younger generations, women, those living in rural areas, and those with higher education levels have a faster return to traditional gender attitudes. In comparison, older generations, men, those living in urban areas, and those with lower education levels have a slower return to traditional attitudes. At the same time, marriage and childbearing are important reasons for the difference in the rate of change in gender perceptions across generations, but not the whole reason; among them, those who are married and divorced are more traditional than those who are unmarried, and the more children they have, the more traditional their gender perceptions are.
The spread of gender equality concepts is not an inevitable consequence of social development, nor does it occur naturally with increased social modernization. Active promotion by the state and society remains indispensable in protecting women’s rights and interests and improving women’s status, thus requiring the inclusion of a gender perspective in the formulation of legal policies to create conditions for women’s participation in social development; it also requires recognition of women’s economic contributions and dedication to their families to help them better balance family and work.
Reference.
[1] Yang JH, Li HJ, Zhu G. Analysis of Chinese people’s gender perceptions trends and characteristics in the past 20 years[J]. Women’s Studies Series, 2014,(6).
[2] Jia Yunzhu, Ma Dongling. A multi-perspective consideration of the change of gender concept: the example of “male domination and female domination”[J]. Women’s Studies Series,2015,(3).
[3] Shu, Xiaoling and Yifei Zhu. Uneven Transitions: Period and Cohort Related Changes in Gender Attitudes in China, 1995-2007[J]. Social Science Research, 2012,41(5).
[4] Gu Hui. The State, the Market, and the Return of Traditional Gender Attitudes[J]. Academic, 2013,(6).
[5] Yang Juhua. The continuity and change of Chinese gender concepts in the past 20 years[J]. Shandong Social Science, 2017 (11): 60-71.