Suchergebnisse

AbstractSonless families may pose a gendered demographic dividend. As fertility declines, families with only daughters are likely to grow. In turn, patriarchal family systems may weaken when many families are unable to engage in patriarchal practices. I examine some of these theorized dynamics in India. Sonless families did grow as fertility declined, reaching 10 percent in India as a whole in 2015 and approaching 20 percent in states with earlier fertility declines. I also identify a substantial influence of children's sex on mothers' expectations of old‐age support. Using panel data from the India Human Development Survey, I compare women's expectations after they had children to earlier expectations when they did not yet have children. Women with sons kept or further embraced patriarchal expectations that a son would provide support. Sonless mothers largely gave up patriarchal expectations, turning to daughters or away from children altogether.

In recent decades, arranged marriages have become less common in many parts of Asia. This paper explores people's schemas surrounding just such a marital change in one Indian village using semi‐structured interviews (N = 30) and ethnographic fieldwork. Respondents categorize marriages into two main types: arranged marriages and elopements, also called love marriages. Arranged marriages were common in the past, while elopements are now dominant. Both types of marriages have characteristics that are perceived positively and the ideal marriage is a hybrid of the two. Respondents ascribe the rise of love marriages to educational expansion, technological change, and foreign influence. Many also see it as an inevitable part of a larger process of socioeconomic change. These schemas are strongly shaped by global influences, but also reflect multiple layers of local beliefs and cultures. The schemas also demonstrate a complex integration of both structural and ideational factors in accounting for marital change.

AbstractScholars traditionally argued that industrialization, urbanization, and educational expansion lead to a decline in extended families and complementary rise in nuclear families. Some have suggested that such transitions are good for young married women because living in nuclear families benefits their health. However, extended families may also present advantages for young women's health that outweigh any disadvantages. Using the Indian National Family Health Survey, this article examines whether young married women living in nuclear families have better health than those in patrilocal extended families. It also examines whether young married women's living arrangements are changing over time and, if so, how such changes will affect their health. Results show that young married women living in nuclear families do not have better health than those in patrilocal extended families. Of eight health outcomes examined, only five differ significantly by family structure. Further, of the five outcomes that differ, four are patrilocal extended-family advantages and only one is a nuclear-family advantage. From 1992 to 2006, the percentage of young married women residing in nuclear families increased, although the majority remained in patrilocal extended families. This trend toward nuclear families will not benefit young women's health.

This article describes the conception of marital quality held by respondents living in one Indian village, as identified through an analysis of semistructured interviews (n=46). The respondents' conception of marital quality is summed up in the overarching ideal of the life partner and characterized by the dimensions of love, peace, understanding, communication, trust, and balance. This conception is then compared to the conception of marital quality found in the literature, which was developed in reference to Western contexts. The comparison suggests that the respondents' conception of marital quality intersects in many ways with that found in the literature, but there are also important differences. These results point to the importance of greater examination of marital quality in non-Western contexts without unthinkingly applying Western measures.

Marital quality is well established as a determinant of health in Western contexts, yet the importance of relationship quality to health in non‐Western contexts is largely limited to a focus on domestic violence. Using the Women's Reproductive Histories Survey, this study examines whether women with higher‐quality family relationships are more likely than others to use maternal health‐care services in Madhya Pradesh, India. Results show that among nuclear families, women with better marital relationships are more likely than others to use antenatal care services and to deliver in a health‐care facility. Among joint families, women who have better relationships with their in‐laws are more likely to use antenatal care services. The results further suggest that women's agency mediates some, but not all, of the effect of relationship quality on use of maternal health‐care services.

Using data from interviews with matched couples recorded in the 2001 Nepal Demographic and Health Survey, this report explores how incorporating both spouses' reports of household decisionmaking may change the understanding of the determinants and consequences of women's autonomy. Results indicate that a substantial proportion of couples disagree about who makes household decisions, but the determinants of women's autonomy are still largely similar according to both spouses' reports. The assessment of the effects of two important sources of autonomy—women's education and employment—differs significantly between spouses, however. When spouses agree that the wife is autonomous, the association between her autonomy and her use of health‐care services is found to be substantially stronger than when spouses disagree about her autonomy. This finding suggests that the association between women's autonomy and health‐care‐service use may be underestimated when only women's reports are considered.

This paper examines endorsement of developmental idealism (DI) about marriage in the United States, as well as differences in such endorsement by demographic characteristics. It is the first study to assess whether Americans relate changes in marriage to societal development—a key dimension of DI. The analysis draws on nationally representative survey data with 44 items designed to measure DI beliefs and attitudes about nine different marriage attributes. Overall, endorsement of DI about marriage, as well as unions more broadly conceived, is widespread in the United States. Large majorities of Americans believed "modern" marriage attributes are more common in developed countries, thought development causes marital change, believed marriage changed in the past, and expected marriage will change in the future in ways that are consistent with DI. Large majorities also believed long-standing "modern" marriage behaviors are good, but not newer "modern" behaviors of cohabitation, premarital sex, and same-sex marriage. Endorsement of marriage DI also differed consistently by race, education, and age: it was greater among non-Hispanic Whites, more educated individuals, and younger people. Differences by marital status and gender were small or nil.

In this introduction, we offer an overview of developmental idealism (DI) theory and the contributions of this special issue. DI is a collection of values and beliefs about socioeconomic development and its causal links to other elements of societies. Within DI, some societal elements are identified as "modern," inherently good, and helpful to development, while others are identified as "traditional," undesirable, and unhelpful to development. DI theory posits that these schemas spread from Northwest European elites to ordinary people. In turn, people are motivated to adopt "modern" behaviors because they are seen as the means of achieving a good life and socioeconomic development. The articles in this special issue contribute to the empirical investigation of DI theory in a variety of ways. This issue enriches the DI methodological toolkit, demonstrating, for example, that DI measures are valid and reliable and that internet search queries can be used to examine DI. The articles also make strides in assessing the prevalence and nature of DI thinking, from the internet to far-flung geographic locations, including Albania, Kenya, Nepal, and Vietnam. Finally, this issue contributes to identifying pathways for the spread of DI, pointing to national elites, monetary incentives, and television.

This article examines a half-century of trends in family attitudes and beliefs in the United States, including attitudes toward gender, marriage, childbearing, cohabitation, sex outside marriage, divorce, and same-sex relations. These trends are viewed through the lens of developmental idealism. We also describe how the developmental idealism framework applies to Western contexts generally and the United States specifically. We trace family attitudes from the 1960s through 2018 using four data sources: the Intergenerational Panel Study of Parents and Children, Monitoring the Future, the General Social Survey, and the International Social Survey Programme. We find profound and largely consistent changes in Americans' attitudes. We argue these changes can be understood as the expansion of developmental idealism in the United States. Americans increasingly endorsed family attributes long understood as modern under developmental idealism, as well as attributes more recently viewed as modern through extensions of freedom and equality. At the same time, sizable majorities remained committed to marriage and children. While Americans increasingly supported all individuals' freedom to choose among a diversity of family behaviors, most continued to view marriage and children favorably in their own lives.