Using four-wave panel data of 1,327 older adults in rural China, this study examined potential gender and marital status differences in the relationships between three forms of intergenerational support (monetary, instrumental and emotional support) and the level of depression of the older adults. Results from a pooled time-series fixed-effects model showed that receiving and providing monetary support had a comparable beneficial effect on mothers and fathers, but mothers benefited more psychologically than fathers from closer relationships with their children. Exchanges in instrumental support was not related to either mothers' or fathers' level of depression. Widowhood further affected the gendered relationships between support and depression in that recently widowed fathers had a significantly higher level of depression when they received more monetary support from their children. In contrast, providing monetary support to children was associated with a significantly higher level of depression among recently widowed mothers. We explained the findings in the context of familial and gender norms in the Chinese culture and temporal needs for family support that link with bereavement coping stages among older adults. We argued that the gender and marital status patterns observed in this study are attributive to more fundamental differences in men's and women's social positions in the Chinese society.

This study examined how intergenerational exchanges with sons and daughters predicted older parents’ likelihood of co-residing with a son prior to death in a rural area of China’s Anhui Province. Our investigation drew on theories of contingent co-residence, modernization, and social exchange, conceptualizing co-residence as having practical and symbolic importance in rural Chinese culture. The sample included 470 older parents, reported as deceased during 2001–2009, and their posthumous informants. We used logistic regression to assess intergenerational support and cohesion as predictors of co-residence with a son just prior to death. Older parents who provided instrumental support to, and received instrumental support from, sons and had better emotional relationships with sons were more likely than their counterparts to co-reside with a son at the end of life. Living with sons demonstrates filial piety for older parents at the end of life, but its realization is sensitive to intergenerational transactions.

This study examines how intergenerational exchanges affect elders' choice of preferred care-givers in the case of sickness among adult children in rural China. The sample derived from a four-wave longitudinal study in Anhui Province, China, based on which we constructed three time intervals (i.e. 2001–2003, 2003–2006 and 2006–2009) and stacked them. Our working sample included 10,181 observations from these three stacked intervals, representing 4,927 children with 1,170 elder parents. We used fixed-effects logistic regression to predict elders' favouritism among their children. Results show that those children who received more help with grandchild care from parents, who provided instrumental support to parents and whose spouses provided instrumental support to parents were more likely to be named the preferred care-givers. On average, parents favoured sons. For mothers, this favouritism was completely explained by proximity and intergenerational exchanges, and even reversed under certain circumstances. For fathers, this favouritism of sons was partially explained by proximity and intergenerational exchanges. Migrant children were less likely to be preferred care-givers. This effect was moderated by elder parents' help with caring for grandchildren. Particularly, mothers favoured daughters over sons if the above moderation effect was considered. We discuss these findings in the context of social changes including increased importance of daughters in elder parents' support networks and the large-scale rural to urban migration.

This study tests two evolutionary hypotheses on grandparental investments differentiated by the child's sex: the paternity uncertainty hypothesis and the Trivers–Willard hypothesis. Data are from two culturally different countries: the Dutch Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (n=2375) and the Chinese Anhui Survey (n=4026). In the Netherlands, grandparental investments are biased towards daughters' children, which is in accordance with the paternity uncertainty hypothesis. But in China, grandparental investments are biased towards sons' children, which is in conflict with the paternity uncertainty hypothesis. This study found no support for the Trivers–Willard hypothesis. These results raise doubts over the relevance of paternity uncertainty as an explanation of a grandparental investment bias towards daughters' children that is often found in Western populations. The results suggest that discriminative grandparental investments are better understood as the outcome of cultural prescriptions and economic motives.

The purpose of this article is to review, contrast and synthesise several major intellectual streams that have guided theoretical development and empirical research in the area of intergenerational family support to older people: (a) normative-integrative approaches that focus on cohesion between family members based on bonds of solidarity and norms of filial obligation, and (b) transactional approaches that are primarily concerned with identifying motives for resource transfers across generational lines. We propose the concept of moral capital – defined as the stock of internalised social norms that obligate children to care for and support their older parents – the transmission of which lies at the intersection of self-interest (for parents) and altruism (for children). Using data from a multigenerational family study, we present an empirical analysis showing that a strong positive correspondence in the filial obligations of adult children and their older mothers – arguably the result of intergenerational transmission – elevated the supportive behaviour of children. We suggest that moral capital may be a useful unifying concept that bridges disciplinary and theoretical divides in the study of intergenerational transfers to elderly people by helping resolve the paradox of how self-interest and selflessness can co-exist within families.

This investigation examines how support from adult children is affected by their parents' involvement in grandchild care. Instead of focusing on dyadic interactions, we adopt a gendered extended family perspective to examine how financial and emotional support from children was influenced when their siblings received help with child care from their elder parents. The data were from a two-wave (2001, 2003) longitudinal study of 4,791 parent–child dyads with 1,162 parents, aged 60 and older, living in rural areas of Anhui Province, China. Random effects regression showed that emotional support from both sons and daughters was strengthened when parents provided more child care for their other adult children; in addition, daughters were more emotionally responsive than sons under this situation. Concerning dyadic parent–child relationships, daughter and sons increased their financial support, and sons increased their emotional support when they themselves received help with child care from parents. We suggest taking a gendered extended family perspective when studying intergenerational relationships in rural China.

This paper examines the impact of the out-migration of adult children on older parents' inter-generational support and psychological wellbeing in rural China. The sample comprised 1,237 older Chinese people aged 60 or more years in the rural province of Anhui, China, who completed baseline and follow-up questionnaires in 2001 and 2003, respectively. The differences between older parents with and without migrant children in 2001 in their support and psychological wellbeing in 2003 were examined using independent t-tests, as were changes over the two years in support and wellbeing. Multiple regression models were used to examine the impact of baseline out-migration on the psychological wellbeing of older parents at follow-up. The results showed that, compared to parents without migrant children in 2001, the parents of migrants had significantly more monetary support, less instrumental support, and a lower level of depression in 2003. Such differences may be attributed to different support resources and health status, but the regressions revealed that when the positive effect of inter-generational support was taken into account, older parents with more migrant children tended to have significantly more depression and lower life satisfaction. The findings point to the importance of continued inter-generational support after out-migration in maintaining parental wellbeing.

Identity theory suggests that individuals who perceive their family roles as salient and feel competent in their performance have greater psychological well-being than others. This paper assesses the ways in which aspects of parent, grandparent and great-grandparent role investments affect self-esteem, levels of depression and affect-balance. The 188 respondents with an average age of 73 years were participants in the University of Southern California Longitudinal Study of Generations and occupied all three roles at the time of measurement. They self-assessed quality of performance, importance to one's identity and satisfaction in their family roles. Overall, levels of role investment declined consistently with greater lineage distance from parent to great-grandparent. Latent correlations showed that parent role investment was most highly associated with well-being, followed by investment in grandparent and great-grandparent roles. Structural equation modelling, however, revealed no unique effects on well-being for any of the three roles (as a result of high inter-correlations). All three role structures formed a single meta-construct that was positively related to psychological well-being. It is concluded that the strength and consequences of inter-generational role investments were hierarchically structured by relational proximity, but also manifested in a single integrated family identity, which suggests that there are two competing and complementary views of family role structures in later life.