Page 25 - IJPS-4-1

Xiaorong Gu

Figure 2. Trends of educational homogamy over four decades

Figure 3. The strength of homogamy over four decades.

6. Discussion

Based on three waves of pooled CGSS data, this study has explored two dimensions of Chinese youths’ transition to first
marriage over four decades - their transition tempo and the homogamy patterns. Thus far, the analysis has yielded the
following key findings in answering the research questions laid out earlier. Regarding the marriage formation tempo, there
is no evidence of systematic delays in family formation among cohorts coming of age after reform, although moderate
cross-cohort heterogeneity. It seems that, against vicissitudes in sociopolitical contexts, the script of passage to first marriage
among youths remains rather stable and normative: By the age of 30, the majority in each cohort have married. However,
two cohorts are identified for their unique trajectories, which reflect an intricate relationship despite broader social structures
and individual life course patterns. The Cultural Revolution cohort experiences a relatively protracted passage to marriage,
simultaneously with a relatively high proportion of marriage by age 20 and high singlehood rate by age 30 (7%, relatively
low by international standards). This could be related to younger legal marriage ages before the implementation of the 1980
Marriage Law and political movements such as the “sent down” campaign that disrupted young adults’ life course transition.
The late reform cohort, born after 1976, witnesses a rather condensed marriage formation pattern, with temporary delay of
marriage until tertiary education is completed and expedited entry to marriage thereafter. Respondents who belong to older
cohorts, who are men, who have received higher education and hold urban hukou have lower risk in entering first marriage
by a certain age. Regarding the issue of “who marries who” which reflects the level of social closure in a particular society,
rather than seeing a trend of general openness (i.e., decreasing homogamy) with modernization (Smits and Park, 2009;
Smits, Ultee and Lammers, 1998), I recorded steady growing strengths of homogamy across marriage cohorts, with the Ф
parameter climbing from 0.42 for the Cultural Revolution cohort to 0.56 for the late reform cohort. This adds to the empirical
evidence in existing literature which documents the persistence of homogamy as a dominant social norm and practice in
China over different historical periods (Han, 2010; Xu, Ji and Tung, 2010; Xu, Li and Yu, 2014).
Contribution of this study to existing literature is three-fold. First, through combining transition to adulthood literature
and homogamy literature, this study explores not only the tempo of youths’ entry into marriage but also the status
composition of marital unions formed in first marriages in contemporary China. Examining these two dimensions of

International Journal of Population Studies | 2018, Volume 4, Issue 1 19