IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/soinre/v145y2019i2d10.1007_s11205-017-1725-y.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

“It’s for Our Education”: Perception of Parental Migration and Resilience Among Left-behind Children in Rural China

Author

Listed:
  • Shu Hu

    (National University of Singapore)

Abstract

As a result of China’s rural–urban bifurcation, millions of rural Chinese children grow up in the absence of one or both parents due to work migration. Contrary to the dismal picture of left-behind children that is depicted by the mass media, comparative studies based on large-scale survey data suggest that left-behind children do not fare worse than those who live with both parents. Researchers have suggested that the positive effects of remittance might outweigh the negative effects of parental absence, and this explains why there is little total effect of parental migration on children’s wellbeing. This, however, does not explain why left-behind children are doing equally well as non-left-behind children in nearly all aspects of life, some of which are affected more by parental care than by economic resources. This paper aims to explore what factors contribute to the all-round resilience of rural left-behind adolescents. Mixed methods were used to collect both quantitative and qualitative data from adolescents, caregivers, and school teachers from a migrant-sending community in central China. Data analyses reveal that adolescent interpretation of parental migration is deeply embedded in Chinese values on education and ideals of mutual responsibilities among family members, and that a positive understanding of parental motivation for labor migration and commitment to education are significant contributors to the resilience displayed by left-behind adolescents. The heterogeneities in the reaction of left-behind adolescents to parental migration demonstrate that the positive perception of parental migration is not a stand-alone protective factor.

Suggested Citation

  • Shu Hu, 2019. "“It’s for Our Education”: Perception of Parental Migration and Resilience Among Left-behind Children in Rural China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 145(2), pages 641-661, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:soinre:v:145:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s11205-017-1725-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s11205-017-1725-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11205-017-1725-y
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11205-017-1725-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dean Yang, 2008. "International Migration, Remittances and Household Investment: Evidence from Philippine Migrants’ Exchange Rate Shocks," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(528), pages 591-630, April.
    2. Xiaogang Wu & Donald Treiman, 2004. "The household registration system and social stratification in China: 1955–1996," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 41(2), pages 363-384, May.
    3. Krueger, Alan B. & Schkade, David A., 2008. "The reliability of subjective well-being measures," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(8-9), pages 1833-1845, August.
    4. Yaohui Zhao, 1997. "Labor Migration and Returns to Rural Education in China," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 79(4), pages 1278-1287.
    5. Viet Nguyen, Cuong, 2016. "Does parental migration really benefit left-behind children? Comparative evidence from Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 230-239.
    6. Alan De Brauw & Scott Rozelle, 2008. "Reconciling the Returns to Education in Off‐Farm Wage Employment in Rural China," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(1), pages 57-71, February.
    7. Laura Camfield, 2012. "Resilience and Well-being Among Urban Ethiopian Children: What Role Do Social Resources and Competencies Play?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 107(3), pages 393-410, July.
    8. Sarma, Vengadeshvaran J. & Parinduri, Rasyad A., 2016. "What happens to children's education when their parents emigrate? Evidence from Sri Lanka," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 94-102.
    9. Daniel Shek, 2005. "A Longitudinal Study of Chinese Cultural Beliefs About Adversity, Psychological Well-Being, Delinquency And Substance Abuse in Chinese Adolescents With Economic Disadvantage," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 71(1), pages 385-409, March.
    10. Shawn Kanaiaupuni & Katharine Donato, 1999. "Migradollars and mortality: The effects of migration on infant survival in Mexico," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 36(3), pages 339-353, August.
    11. Oswald, Andrew J. & Wu, Stephen, 2010. "Objective Confirmation of Subjective Measures of Human Well-being: Evidence from the USA," IZA Discussion Papers 4695, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Wang, Haining & Cheng, Zhiming & Zhe Wang, Ben & Chen, Yuanyuan, 2021. "Childhood left-behind experience and labour market outcomes in China," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 196-207.
    2. Fu, Linyun & Zhu, Yiqi, 2020. "Are rural children of work-away parents really left behind? Voices from rural teachers," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    3. Ming Wen & Weidong Wang & Neng Wan & Dejun Su, 2020. "Family Income and Student Educational and Cognitive Outcomes in China: Exploring the Material and Psychosocial Mechanisms," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-23, December.
    4. Xiaoxia Xie & Yafan Chen & Shannon Cheung & Chien-Chung Huang, 2022. "Social Innovation and Health-Related Well-Being of Left-Behind Children: Evidence from an Intelligent Robot Project in China," Applied Research in Quality of Life, Springer;International Society for Quality-of-Life Studies, vol. 17(5), pages 2597-2617, October.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hou, Benyufang & Liu, Hong & Wang, Sophie Xuefei, 2020. "Returns to military service in off-farm wage employment: Evidence from rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 59(C).
    2. Kriti Vikram, 2023. "Timing and Frequency of Fathers’ Migration and Nutritional Status of Left-Behind Children in India: A Life Course Approach," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 42(1), pages 1-29, February.
    3. Zhang, Yi & Matz, Julia Anna, 2017. "On the train to brain gain in rural China," Discussion Papers 252443, University of Bonn, Center for Development Research (ZEF).
    4. Björn NILSSON, 2019. "Education and migration: insights for policymakers," Working Paper 23ca9c54-061a-4d60-967c-f, Agence française de développement.
    5. Alpaslan Akay & Olivier Bargain & Klaus F. Zimmermann, 2017. "Home Sweet Home?: Macroeconomic Conditions in Home Countries and the Well-Being of Migrants," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 52(2), pages 351-373.
    6. O'Donnell, Gus & Oswald, Andrew J., 2015. "National well-being policy and a weighted approach to human feelings," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 59-70.
    7. Bingdao Zheng & Yanfeng Gu, 2022. "Institutional dynamics and access to non‐farm employment in rural China, 1950–1996," Australian Economic History Review, Economic History Society of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(3), pages 265-289, November.
    8. Thanasis Ziogas & Dimitris Ballas & Sierdjan Koster & Arjen Edzes, 2020. "How happy are my neighbours? Modelling spatial spillover effects of well-being," Papers 2007.11580, arXiv.org.
    9. Mozumder, Lavlu & Islam, Mohammad Amirul, 2017. "Effects Of Remittances On Human Capital Development: An Empirical Analysis," Bangladesh Journal of Agricultural Economics, Bangladesh Agricultural University, vol. 36(1-2), April.
    10. Ludwig, Jens & Duncan, Greg J. & Katz, Lawrence F. & Kessler, Ronald & Kling, Jeffrey R. & Gennetian, Lisa A. & Sanbonmatsu, Lisa, 2012. "Neighborhood Effects on the Long-Term Well-Being of Low-Income Adults," Scholarly Articles 11870359, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    11. Stone Arthur A, 2011. "A Rationale for Including a Brief Assessment of Hedonic Well-being in Large-scale Surveys," Forum for Health Economics & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 14(2), pages 1-15, April.
    12. Alan De Brauw & Scott Rozelle, 2008. "Reconciling the Returns to Education in Off‐Farm Wage Employment in Rural China," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(1), pages 57-71, February.
    13. Van Landeghem, Bert, 2012. "A test for the convexity of human well-being over the life cycle: Longitudinal evidence from a 20-year panel," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 571-582.
    14. Olivier Bargain, 2017. "Welfare analysis and redistributive policies," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 15(4), pages 393-419, December.
    15. Sylvie Démurger & Shi Li, 2013. "Migration, Remittances, and Rural Employment Patterns: Evidence from China," Research in Labor Economics, in: Labor Market Issues in China, pages 31-63, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    16. Andrew J. Oswald, 2010. "Emotional Prosperity and the Stiglitz Commission," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 48(4), pages 651-669, December.
    17. Yitao Jiang & Xiaojun Shi & Shunming Zhang & Jingjing Ji, 2011. "The threshold effect of high‐level human capital investment on China's urban‐rural income gap," China Agricultural Economic Review, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 3(3), pages 297-320, September.
    18. Blanchflower, David G & Oswald, Andrew, 2011. "International Happiness," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 39, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    19. Frijters, Paul & Clark, Andrew E. & Krekel, Christian & Layard, Richard, 2020. "A happy choice: wellbeing as the goal of government," Behavioural Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 4(2), pages 126-165, July.
    20. Marchetta, Francesca & Sim, Sokcheng, 2021. "The effect of parental migration on the schooling of children left behind in rural Cambodia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:soinre:v:145:y:2019:i:2:d:10.1007_s11205-017-1725-y. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.