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Intergenerational support among widowed older adults in China

Regarding coresidence, one on hand, the number of ADL limitations was positively
associated with living with children, after controlling for all covariates (1.19). On
the other hand, more ADL limitations were also associated with higher odds of living
in nursing homes (1.21). Neither education nor pension receipt was significantly
associated with the odds of coresidence.
As expected, widows received a greater amount of financial support (0.07) and
were more likely to live with their children (1.20) than widowers. Moreover, age
was positively related to financial assistance (0.005), emotional support (1.02), and
coresidence (1.03). Among those who received positive net financial transfers from
their children, widowed older adults in rural areas received less than their urban
counterparts (-0.59), but widowed older adults in rural areas were more likely to
receive care from children (1.36) and were less likely to live in nursing homes than
their counterparts in urban areas (0.59). Compared with non-Hans, Hans received less
financial assistance from their children (0.21) and were less likely to receive emotional
support from their children (0.68) or live with their children (0.50).
3.2.2 Child’s Gender and Number of Children

Table 2 also shows that children, both sons and daughters, played an important role in
all types of support to the widowed. In general, widowed older adults who had more
sons or daughters were more likely to receive financial support from children, receive
care from children, confide in children, and live with children than those who had
fewer children. The number of sons and daughters was also positively associated with
the amount of money received by the widowed. Therefore, regardless of the gender
of the child, the more children the better old-age support in China. The number of
children in close proximity was also positively related to the odds of receiving sick
care (1.29) and emotional support (1.05) and negatively associated with the odds
of living in nursing homes (0.76). On the other hand, the number of children living
nearby was associated with lower odds of receiving financial support (0.93), lower
amount of net financial transfer (-0.04), and lower odds of coresidence (0.79).
We followed Xie and Zhu’s (2009) work and controlled for living arrangements in
the analyses of financial support, sick care, and emotional support. Not surprisingly,
coresidence was positively associated with the likelihood of these transfers from
children. Widowed older adults in nursing homes seemed to be the most disadvantaged.
Compared to those living alone or with relatives, those living in nursing homes were
less likely to receive financial support (0.74), sick care (0.09), and emotional support
(0.17) from their children.

3.2.3 Marital History of Widowed Older Adults
As shown in Table 2, those who had multiple marriages were less likely to receive
financial support (0.76), sick care (0.71), and emotional support (0.70) from their
children, relative to those who were married only once. Even for those who received
net financial transfers from their children, the widowed with a history of multiple
marriages received less than those who were married only once (-0.17). Widowed old
adults’ marital history, however, had no significant bearing on living arrangements.

3.3 Sources of Support by Provider’s Gender and Family Ties with
Widowed Parents
In previous analyses, we found that widowed older adults in China relied heavily on
their children for multiple types of old age support. Next, we examined who provided
what support and whether these patterns vary between widows and widowers.
Table 3 shows clearly that sons and daughters-in-laws were still the main providers
of financial assistance, sick care, and emotional support and were most likely to
live with widowed parents in China. Nevertheless, the majority of widowed older
adults reported that daughters also provided financial assistance to them. The
patterns somewhat vary by parents’ gender. Widows were more likely to receive
financial assistance from both sons and daughters than were widowers (70% vs. 63%,

102 International Journal of Population Studies 2017, Volume 3, Issue 1