Suchergebnisse

The current study extends our understanding of the widely documented gender educational gap in favor of females and its contributing factors through a mixed-methods analysis of the Chinese case. We develop an analytical framework that incorporates three mechanisms—intergenerational social contract, non-cognitive skills, and cumulative (dis)advantage across the life course—to empirically assess gendered achievement patterns and their social mechanisms among Chinese adolescents. The Chinese Family Panel Studies data documented that adolescent girls have higher verbal and math achievements than boys, with the gap larger in verbal than in math scores. Three factors account for these gender gaps: (1) (grand)parents hold higher expectations for girls, monitor girls more closely, and invest in girls as much as in boys; (2) girls possess better non-cognitive skills; and (3) girls' stronger performance in earlier years gives them an edge for later achievement. The in-depth interviews contextualize these statistical patterns in profound changes in families' logic in supporting girls' education and in reconfigured gender discourses about girls' learning behavior. From the perspective of intergenerational contracts, in the context of low fertility, daughters have become cherished as long-term family members at the receiving end of intensive investment, particularly as educational competition intensifies in post-reform China. Moreover, a gender discourse, engaged by family members and teachers, about girls' superior non-cognitive skills such as compliance and self-discipline exerts a powerful influence as a self-fulfilling prophecy with regards to girls' achievement. The findings underscore the need to account for both cultural and policy contexts, and nuanced gender work at home and in school in understanding the gender-gap reversal in contemporary China.

The continued emphasis on a decontextualized nuclear family in Asia has often obscured experiences of re-partnered individuals and stepfamilies, wherein transitions including couple dissolution and remarriage or cohabitation have had particular implications for family well-being and social mobility. The eight papers in this special issue expand scholarship beyond acknowledging the increasing prevalence of re-partnership and stepfamilies seeking to facilitate cross-cultural comparisons within the region, and between Asia and the West where notable advancements have been made in theorising diverse family processes. The pertinence of extended family ties and the cultural pressures of collectivism advance shared perspectives of re-partnership and stepfamily formation across East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia. At the same time, drawing from quantitative and qualitative methodologies, these papers direct attention to the heterogeneity in re-partnership pathways where broader social categories such as class, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, religion and historicity differentially intersect across national and socio-political contexts.

Using a qualitative life history approach, this article offers to enhance our understanding of how remarriage impacts social mobility trajectories amongst ethnic minority women in Singapore. In particular, the attention to ethnic minority Malay women's biographies reveals how the intersections of "ethnicity" and "class" render visibility to how re-partnership entails social exclusion that is morally and culturally coded concealing the emotional and material struggles that women in stepfamilies cope with. In comparing the lived experiences of remarried middle-class Malay women with their working-class counterparts, this article argues that stepfamily formation in Singapore in fact tends to deepen rather than mitigate vulnerabilities, particularly for the latter, thus failing to live up to the lure of economic stability that repartnerships are conventionally assumed to provide. In so doing, the article also argues for a nuanced understanding of social mobility as a non-linear process rather than an outcome.

PurposeAsia's traditional experiences with care provision differ considerably from those of the West given the prevalent family‐based social norms about care and policies in this region. In recent decades, Asia has experienced profound social and demographic transformations and is thus faced with significant challenges around care. However, care in Asian countries is a relatively less studied topic. There is an urgent need for a comparative study on recent policy and practice changes in care for the elderly and young children in different regions of Asia. The purpose of this special issue is to examine complicated boundary shift in care provision and financing between the state, market, community and family in East, Southeast and South Asia and to explore the implications of these changes in care policies and practices for social stratification by class and gender in Asia.Design/methodology/approachThe introduction to this special issue gives an overview of the social and demographic transformations and new strains on care in Asia as a background and introduces the framework of welfare mix employed in this special issue, especially the concepts of social care and the welfare/care diamond.FindingsThe introduction summarizes the variations in regard to the governance and provision of care between different Asian countries and compares the differences in the state involvement between Asia and Europe.Originality/valueThe authors also discuss some of their contributions to methodological approaches and analytical frameworks in studying care and the implications of the current research for future studies.