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INTRODUCTION
February 1985
193
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OF MARRIAGE
February 1985
Year
Numberof
Children
National
Changefrom
PreviousTime +
Numberof
Children
Rural
Changefrom
PreviousTime +
Numberof
Children
Urban
Changefrom
PreviousTime +
1940
1945
1950
1955
5.25
5.30
5.81
6.26
1960
1965
-a
+0.05
+0.51
+ 0.45
4.02
6.08
-2.24
+2.06
_
5.96
6.39
__
+0.43
5.00
5.67
4.00
6.60
-2.39
+ 2.60
4.06
3.75
+ 0.67
1970
5.81
-0.27
6.38
-0.22
3.27
-1.01
-0.31
-0.48
1975
3.57
-2.24
3.95
-2.43
1.78
-1.49
1980
2.24
-1.33
2.48
-1.47
1.15
-0.63
1981
2.63
+ 0.39
2.91
+ 0.43
1.39
+ 0.24
Source:Calculatedand adaptedfrom An Analysisof a NationalOne-Per-Thousand-Population
SampleSurvey
in BirthRate, Specialissueof Renkouyu Jinji (PopulationandEconomics),EconomicsInstituteof Beijing,China,
1983,Appendix1, pp. 152-160.
aNot available.
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195
TABLE 2. COMPARISON OF FIRST, SECOND, AND HIGHER ORDER BIRTHS AND PERCENTAGE CH
Number of Births
First Birth
0
C:
z
0
t'll
Year
Totala
Number of
Children
1970
1977
1981
29,295
19,997
21,342
Number Percentage
of
of
Total
Children
6,073
6,171
9,938
20.73%
30.86
46.57
%
Change
+ 10.13
+ 15.71
Second Birth
Number Percentage
of
%
of
Total
Children
Change
4,998
4,918
5,411
17.06%
24.59
25.35
+7.53
+0.76
0ni
TABLE 3. PERCENTAGES OF SINGLE- AND MULTIPARITY BIRTHS, 1980 AND 1981 AND PERCENTA
ni
H
1980-1981
%
Percentage Percentage
of Total
of Total
Change
Order of Birth
ITI
cr
Ct
Rural
National
1980
One birth
Two births
Three births
Four births
Five and above
38.83%
25.21
14.52
8.94
12.38
1981
44.17%
23.72
12.81
7.41
11.67
+ 13.75%
-5.91
-11.78
-17.11
-5.74
Percentage Percentage
of Total
of Total
1980-1981
%
Change
40.45%
25.02
13.85
8.11
12.58
+ 12.33%
-1.50
-11.33
-14.54
-6.88
1980
36.01%
25.40
15.62
9.49
13.51
1981
February 1985
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197
198
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February 1985
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199
Household Composition
Husband, wife, and their unmarmarried child
Characteristics
Husband, wife, with either married sons or daughters and sometimes the latters' cousins, as well as
their children
Note: This typology is constructed by the author on the bases of other classificatory schemes developed by Litwak
(1960), Kerckhoff (1965), Sussman (1976), and Gallin (1984).
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OF MARRIAGE
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
February 1985
The government program of one child per family has introduced an external factor that tends to
foster the nucleation of the extended Chinese
family. However, the demographic features of the
future family structure in China will not become
very obvious until the next century when the onechild generation starts getting married and establishing its own families. However, the widespread
eager response of the younger generation to
modernization and its concomitant influence on
material consumption has a more immediate impact on loosening the bonds of the extended family system. The new construction strategy, which
aims at smaller space but complete facilities in
apartment buildings, encourages neolocal households. As a result single-family dwellings eventually will become the dominant type of living arrangement in urban Chinese society. The coexistence of peasants' freedom and their financial
ability to build houses and the necessity of joint
economic activities and old-age support is most
likely to sustain both independent familial living
and extended households in the rural areas.
Nevertheless, the overarching extended traditions
and reciprocal intergenerational relationships undoubtedly will continue to exert a binding force
on divided conjugal units in both urban and rural
contexts.
It is clear that both social policy and economic
development have strongly influenced the changes
that recently have taken place in the Chinese family. The prospective direction and degree of these
changes also will depend on the presence of these
sources of influence and their interactions with
other factors. Therefore, the changing extended
Chinese family, in the face of rapid demographic
and societal transformations, remains an interesting and illuminating case for comparative family
research in the future.
FOOTNOTES
1. These census data show that China has a total of
221,173,785households,of which 220,100,775are
domestic households (headed by a married couple)
and the remaining 1,073,010 are collective households, generally consisting of widows, widowers,
and the childless elderly in the countryside (State
Statistical Bureau of China, 1982).
February 1985
JOURNAL
REFERENCES
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