Women's Education, Intergenerational Coresidence, and Household Decision-Making in China

Headnote

Objective: This study examines how intergenerational coresidence modifies the association between women's education and their household decision-making power in China.

Background: Past research on how married women's education increases their decision-making power at home has focused primarily on nuclear families. This article extends prior research by examining how this association varies by household structure. It compares women living with their husbands with those living with both their husbands and parents-in-law.

Method: This article used data from the China Family Panel Studies in 2010 and 2014. It employed marginal structural models to address the concern that certain characteristics selecting women of less power into coresidence with their parents-in-law may be endogenous to women's education.

Results: In nuclear households, women with a higher level of education have a higher probability of having the final say on household decisions. In multigenerational households, however, where women live with their parents-in-law, a higher level of education of women is not associated with an increase in women's decision-making power.

Conclusion: Coresidence with husbands' parents may undermine the effect of women's education on their household decision-making power.

Key Words: coresidence, decision-making, education, gender, intergenerational relations, power.

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)

Decision-making power at home is essential to women's empowerment (Malhotra & Schuler, 2005). Male dominance in family decision-making increases intimate partner violence (Coleman & Straus, 1986), depression (Mirowsky, 1985), and marital dissatisfaction (Pimentel, 2000). Each spouse's socioeconomic resources (Blood & Wolfe, 1960), gender attitudes (Blumberg & Coleman, 1989), and expertise in and share of household responsibilities (Raven, Centers, & Rodrigues, 1975; Zuo, 2008; Zuo & Bian, 2005) affect decision-making patterns. Women's education may enhance their power by increasing their socioeconomic resources (Xu & Lai, 2002), exposing them to more egalitarian gender attitudes (Shu, 2004), and enhancing their capabilities to make household decisions (Kabeer, 2005). However, most studies on women's education and decision-making power have focused on nuclear households and assumed that the division of power involves only the husband-wife dyad. Would higher education improve women's decision-making power in multigenerational households? How might coresidence with the older generation moderate the effect of women's education on their power? This article addresses this gap and examines how the relationship between women's education and their decision-making power varies by household structure. Multigenerational relations and...