The Effect of Parental Behaviors on Children’s Views of Gender Equality

• In Event: 3204 - Student Forum Session: Partnership and Parenting among Asian Families

Abstract

With a lack of systematic gender education in Chinese schools, parental behaviors and family education is particularly important in the process of gender role socialization in China. The major questions studied in this paper are about (1) how parental behaviors influence the construction of children’s understanding of gender roles and (2) how internal gender inequality between sons and daughters affect gender role socialization. This paper utilizes the data from China Family Panel Studies to estimate the effect of parental behaviors on children’s views of gender roles and equality. The estimation shows that the difference on time spending on housework between parents has a significant effect on children’s understanding of gender equality. The results also indicate that one-child daughters receive more financial support on education from their parents than girls who have siblings; this difference is not significant between only-child sons and daughters.

Author

• Feiya Suo, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill