Are daughters more preferred by young people in contemporary China? Qualitative evidence from one-child generation cohorts in urban Jiangsu

Abstract

The one-child policy in China brought about a fast decline in fertility levels and an increasingly skewed sex ratio at birth in China. The deep-seated tradition of son preference has been regarded as the main cause. However, news and recent research have pointed out that having daughters appears more popular among young people in urban areas. The analysis reported in this paper was based on empirical evidence drawn from 47 in-depth interviews. Findings highlighted that regarding the preference of sex at birth, a relatively balanced composition is sought in most cases. Other than the absolute dominance of one son and one daughter together, a preference for having a son remains. Although having two daughters has gained greater popularity among young couples, this turns out to be a compromise to some extent. Daughter preference cannot be regarded as a major trend. In practice, a stronger preference for a certain sex increases the fertility rate as couples attempt to fulfil their preferences, whereas no preference signals the least likelihood to realise fertility intentions. In this sense, the desire to have two children with at least one son may help boost fertility.

Keywords:

• Daughter preference
• one-child generation
• son preference
• urban young cohorts

Acknowledgements

Thanks go to Nana Zhang and Sabu Padmadas for their helpful comments on a draft of this manuscript, as well as the anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 The 1.5 child policy was mainly implemented in rural China in the one-child policy era, meaning that a second birth was allowed for rural couples when the first child was a daughter.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by a Ministry of Education (China) Humanities and Social Sciences Research Project under Grant number: 22YJC840022.