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Migration patterns have become more complicated than before. The increase in cross-border marriage has increased the diversity of the student population. A simple distinction between native and immigrant students overly simplifies their diverse backgrounds. Analyzing data from PISA 2012, we attempt to fill the gap in the literature by comparing parental involvement between cross-border marriage, native, and immigrant families in Hong Kong, with a special focus on the roles of family resources and parental expectations. Our findings show that cross-border marriage families are significantly different from and sit between native families and immigrant families in terms of family resources, parental expectations, and parental involvement. Family resources play a greater role than parental expectations in the differences in parental involvement between cross-border marriage families, native families, and migrant families. This suggests that the disadvantages of cross-border marriage and immigrant families in parental involvement largely stem from a lack of family resources.

Despite the proliferation of literature on cross-border marriages, most previous studies have focused on the vulnerability of female marriage migrants due to their immigrant status; few have examined the role of husbands’ power motive in their well-being. To fill this gap, this study investigates the roles of household power structure and the husband’s power motive in husband-to-wife sexual coercion in cross-border marriages in Hong Kong. We hypothesize that as men in cross-border marriages are often socially disadvantaged and stigmatized in the public discourse, they may attempt to use sexual coercion as a form of compensatory masculinity to reclaim power in the private sphere. Using couple-level data from a representative sample in Hong Kong ( N = 871 couples), the results show that cross-border couples have a higher risk of husband-to-wife sexual coercion and that couple power dynamics fully mediate the difference in the prevalence of sexual coercion in local and cross-border marriages. These suggest that men’s high power motive and perpetration of sexual violence are intimately related. Future studies should pay attention to the disadvantaged background and negative labels applied to the men in cross-border marriage when studying the well-being of female marriage migrants and couple dynamics in cross-border marriage migration.

Research that approached self-control as a dyad-level predictor of relationship outcomes is hitherto scarce. To address this research gap, this study investigates three configurations of couples’ level of self-control on marital conflict. We test three competing hypotheses suggested in the literature: similarity hypothesis, complementarity hypothesis, and totality hypothesis. The data used to test these hypotheses is a unique couple data (N = 1698 individuals from 894 married couples) of husbands and wives from a representative sample in Hong Kong. Two-level random-intercept models were employed. Based on our analysis with the difference-score method and response surface analysis, we find evidence to support the similarity hypothesis. The similarity of self-control between husband and wife is important in predicting marital conflict. In contrast, the total level of self-control is not predictive of marital conflict. This study highlights that marital conflict is strongly associated with the mismatch of self-control between partners.

Background: The reassurance provided during patient-therapist interactions is significantly associated with psychosocial outcomes, including fear and increased confidence. Currently, there are no available reviews that discuss the impact of reassurance for patients with musculoskeletal (MSK) pain. The aim of the present review was to qualitatively synthesize themes around reassurance mechanisms, and the impact during the interaction between patients with MSK pain and therapists. A systematic search strategy was undertaken. Studies were included if they were qualitative or mixed methods studies, examining the patient-therapist consultation, in any MSK clinical setting, with any health care professional, for adult patients with acute to chronic MSK pain. A thematic synthesis was conducted and supported by a particular assessment using CERQual. Results: Twenty-four studies were included (451 patients). Certain themes that related to both positive and negative outcomes of reassurance were identified as well as themes that illustrate the mechanisms causative of the outcomes. Using CerQual, we identified the most supported outcomes. Conclusions: Effective reassurance includes affectionate interactions such as therapeutic relationship building and interpersonal skills, an individualized patient-centered approach, education and the provision of self-management strategies. It should be noted that some interactions that use pathoanatomic models led patients to misinterpret the information provided, this created feelings of fear.

The failure of cross-border marriages has often been attributed to the large age discrepancy between husband and wife, while disadvantage resulted from the selectivity of husbands from low socioeconomic backgrounds has received less attention. Analyzing couple-level household survey data ( N = 871) in Hong Kong, this study compares marital conflict in local and cross-border couples by examining the mediating factors such as age discrepancy and socioeconomic disadvantages. Our analysis suggests that cross-border marriages are subject to significantly more frequent marital conflict than local marriages. It also showed that an age discrepancy from 6 to 9 years (older husband) significantly increased the frequency of marital conflict. However, our analysis showed that counter to common assumptions, socioeconomic disadvantages—particularly the couple’s financial stress—instead of nonnormative age hypergamy explained the higher frequency of marital conflict in cross-border marriages.

BACKGROUND Korea’s traditional family values and low rates of fertility and female labor force participation make it an interesting case for examining the dynamics between parenthood transitions, household labor, and paid work. OBJECTIVES Focusing on comparisons between first and additional children, we examine how parenthood transitions affect wives’ and husbands’ respective provisions of household labor and the division of the labor within the couple, as well as how their employment status moderates these relationships. METHODS Using the 2007, 2008, and 2010 waves of the Korean Longitudinal Survey of Women and Families (N = 10,263 couple-waves), we estimate fixed-effects regressions. The dependent variables are the time each spouse spends on household labor and the husband’s share of the couple’s total time spent on the labor. The key independent variables are the number of children and the number interacted with each spouse’s employment status. RESULTS Household labor was gendered prior to the first birth. The child made both spouses provide more household labor; however, the increase was significantly larger for women. Women’s employment buffered the increase to a limited extent. First and additional children had comparable impacts on all outcomes. CONTRIBUTION In Korea’s gendered context, gender inequality in household labor increased further with first children, but not with additional children. The patterns persisted regardless of women’s employment status, implying that first children might increase the double burden on employed women. Policy lessons are drawn to raise fertility and female labor force participation in Korea and other East Asian countries.

(ProQuest: ... denotes formulae omitted.)Family-related attitudes are key correlates of various family processes and outcomes, including family formation and dissolution, the division of household labor, and childbearing and parenting. Despite the important theoretical and policy implications associated with the formation of these attitudes there is little systematic knowledge about it. Furthermore, researchers often argue that these attitudes determine behaviors, not vice versa. In particular, how family attitudes change as one gets older is seldom examined,althoughpastresearchhaspaidextensive attention to the liberalizing trend in family attitudes across cohorts. This lack of understanding is in part due to a lack of longitudinal data at the individual level. In fact, little is known about the within-person changes in family attitudes over time. The available longitudinal evidence comes predominantly from the United States, and no studies from Asia have been conducted.Family formation and dissolution, childbirth, the transition from school to work, unemployment, and retirement are important life stage transitions that most people experience during their lifetime. These transitions may change what people experience, how they define themselves, and with whom they interact, thereby influencing their attitudes. A few studies, mostly conducted in the West, suggest that some of these life stage transitions indeed affect family-related attitudes (e.g., Baxter, Buchler, Perales, & Western, 2015; Fan & Marini, 2000; Trent & South, 1992), and more research, especially in the Asian context, is needed.We filled these gaps in the literature by analyzing the attitudes toward family formation of women in their 20s and 30s in South Korea (hereafter Korea). Data came from the Korean Longitudinal Survey of Women and Families (KLoWF; http://klowf.kwdi.re.kr/main.do? sLang=EN), a nationally representative longitudinal survey conducted in 2007, 2008, 2010, and 2012. We constructed a multiple-item scale that summarizes family-formation attitudes- namely, whether and when respondents think women should marry and have a child.In this study, using cross-sectional ordinary least squares (OLS) regression, we analyzed how women's attitudes relate to their ages. This analysis, in which age and cohort effects are indistinguishable, served as a preliminary examination of age patterns in family attitudes. Second, with individual fixed effects (FE) regression, we investigated changes in attitudes over time. Last, using life stage transitions as covariates in the cross-sectional and FE regression analyses, we examined the extent to which the transitions explain the age gradient in attitudes across individuals and the within-individual changes over time.The cross-sectional results show that older women tended to hold more traditional attitudes than their younger counterparts. Over the 4-year period between 2008 and 2012, women's attitudes became more, not less, traditional. Marriage and childbearing affected both the cross-individual differences and the within-individual changes in attitudes, while no evidence was found for the effects of educational attainment, work, and living arrangements with parents. We explain these findings within the context of a remarkable delay and decline in marriage and fertility in Korea and draw implications for other societies where strong family-centered and gender-divided cultures lag behind rapid economic and social changes.PAST LITERATURE AND THE CURRENT STUDYDifferences and Changes in AttitudesAttitudes toward family-related issues such as marriage, divorce, childbearing, and gender roles are related to family-related behaviors and decision making. The previous theoretical literature has tended to consider family-related attitudes as explanatory factors for family outcomes: These attitudes are the lenses through which individuals interpret the symbolic meaning of their actions and relationships with other people, and, hence, the attitudes affect people's intentions and decisions regarding fertility and marriage (Balbo, Billari, & Mills, 2013; Davis & Greenstein, 2009; Willoughby, Hall, & Luczak, 2015). …

BACKGROUND The one-person household (OPH) is the fastest-growing type of household in many regions of the world, but no systematic work on it has been done outside of Europe and North America. This special collection consists of ten articles that examine the livingalone phenomenon in Asia. OBJECTIVE This paper summarizes their findings, highlights unique features found in Asia, and discusses the implications of the increase in OPH in Asia for individuals’ well-being and societies’ resource distribution. METHODS Census data are used for an international comparison of the prevalence of one-person households. RESULTS The papers reveal vast heterogeneity across regions and within nations. While widows remains a major group of OPH, the rising prevalence of OPH in Asia is mainly fueled by the increase of young urban adults who live alone as a consequence of delayed or declining marriage, increasing divorce, and increasing geographic mobility. Many of them are working class individuals or migrant workers. The impact of living alone varies by cultural, demographic, and policy contexts. The papers identify groups that are potentially vulnerable to social isolation and financial distress and challenge the generally negative stereotypes of the OPH living arrangement. 1 Department of Sociology and Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, Singapore. E-Mail: ariywj@nus.edu.sg. 2 Department of Social Sciences, the Hong Kong Institute of Education, Hong Kong. E-Mail: adamkl@ied.edu.hk. Yeung & Cheung: Living alone: One-person households in Asia 1100 http://www.demographic-research.org CONCLUSIONS OPH will continue to increase in Asia in the next few decades due to the rapid aging trend, declining marriage and fertility rates, and increase in divorce and migration. More theoretical development and empirically-based work is needed to understand the complexity and impact of such a living arrangement.

INTRODUCTIONOver the past few decades, the female labor force participation rate has increased remarkably in post-industrial societies (Brewster & Rindfuss, 2000). The shift in the female labor force participation rate has had significant impacts on family relations. Work-family conflict for both men and women has increased in these societies (Winslow, 2005). Some studies have suggested that the increasingly conflicting demands from the work and the family domains are responsible for the declining marital quality over time (Amato, Johnson, Booth, & Rogers, 2003; Rogers & Amato, 2000). For couples to adapt to these changes, the outsourcing of household tasks has become an important strategy to avert the conflict between work and family roles (Hochschild, 2003).An increasing trend of domestic outsourcing, including the use of paid domestic help and childcare services, has been documented in these societies (Bittman, Matheson, & Meagher, 1999; de Ruijter, 2004; Hochschild, 2003). Among the options of domestic outsourcing, the hiring of domestic help is now common among middle-class families in Asian societies such as Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan (Constable, 2007; Yeoh, Huang, & Gonzalez, 1999; Cheng, 2003; Voyadnoff, 2005b). In Hong Kong, for example, the proportion of households hiring domestic help has tripled between 1987 and 2000 (Chan, 2005). In 2001, at least onefifth of households in Hong Kong that earned HKD$40,000 or above hired a domestic helper (Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department, 2001).Despite the increasing popularity of outsourcing domestic tasks, the possible impact of such outsourcing on family relations remains an important gap in the literature. The contributions of hiring domestic help to the employers' family, such as averting marital conflict and improving marital quality, are often assumed in the literature (Anderson, 2000; Cheng, 2006) but are rarely examined with empirical data. This paper investigates the effects of hiring domestic help on the following two indicators of the employers' family well-being: marital conflict and marital quality. Analyzing data from a representative household survey in Hong Kong (JV=974) using the propensity score matching method, which is currently gaining popularity in sociology (Brand & Halaby, 2006; Frisco, Muller, & Frank, 2007), the current study finds only weak positive effects of hiring domestic help. None of the estimated effects are statistically significant. The data from this study suggest, contrary to some previous claims, that the effects of hiring domestic help on two indicators of family wellbeing for employers are far from substantial. Previous studies which assumed that hiring domestic help enabled middle-class families to enjoy a better family life may have been overly optimistic.PAST LITERATURE AND THE CURRENT STUDYHousehold La bor and Family Well-BeingHousehold labor plays an important role in shaping family well-being (Coltrane, 2000; Shelton & John, 1996). According to the ecological systems perspective, marital well-being is affected not only by characteristics within the family domain, but also by how couples manage the demands from both work and family domains (Voydanoff, 2002). Role strain and conflict associated with work and family demands can negatively affect the marital wellbeing if the couples do not have the resources or effective strategies to manage the conflicting demands and to maintain a balance between the roles (Hill, 2005; Voydanoff 2002, 2005a, 2005b). In contrast, maintaining work-family fit and balance can positively affect the well-being of couples. Nevertheless, managing the conflict between work and family roles has become increasingly difficult, especially in those societies where high demand from the work domain meets the lack of a family-friendly policy environment. Empirical findings from previous studies have already shown that the conflict between work and family roles is negatively related to marital satisfaction, and can lead to marital discord (Coltrane, 2000; Shelton & John, 1996). …

Little scholarly attention has been given to how gender attitudes and family attitudes moderate the effects of domestic labor on marital satisfaction in East Asia, where the heavy and unequal burden of domestic labor on women meets traditional gender ideology and familism. We examined the marital satisfaction of younger Korean women (in their 20s and 30s) and their older counterparts (in their 40s or older) (Person-N = 5,744), using panel data from the Korean Longitudinal Survey of Women and Families. The results reveal that younger wives’ time spent on domestic labor is negatively associated with their satisfaction only when they do not hold traditional family attitudes. Younger women’s gender-role attitudes were not found to moderate the relationship between their husbands’ contribution to domestic labor and their satisfaction. For older women, no evidence was found for either interaction effect. We interpret the findings within the Korean context and draw theoretical implications.

This study examines the applicability of Agnew’s strain theory and Gottfredson and Hirschi’s self-control theory in explaining husband-to-wife psychological aggression and physical assault in a community survey of 871 couples in Hong Kong. Three strains, each belonging to 1 type of Agnew’s types of strain, were selected, namely, dissatisfaction with family financial situation, dissatisfaction with relationship with spouse, and physical abuse by parents in childhood. Self-control was measured with a simplified version of 12 items selected from the 24-item Self-control Scale developed by Grasmick, Tittle, Bursik, and Ameklev (1993). The conditioning effect of self-control on the relationship between strain and husband-to-wife violence was also examined. Results show that 2 of the 3 types of strain and self-control significantly affected both types of spousal violence. In addition, self-control has a conditioning effect on the relationship between strain and husband-to-wife violence, reducing the likelihood of strain leading to violence. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Revisiting the enduring debate on meritocracy in late imperial Chinese history, Lawrence Zhang examines the system of office purchase ( juanna 捐納) and its effects on the composition and nature of Qingdynasty officialdom. Through extensive quantitative analysis of the number of officials who purchased their way into the bureaucracy, and by weighing the costs and benefits of the juanna institution, Zhang argues that this institution was no less important than the civil service examinations in the recruitment of bureaucrats by the imperial center. Wealth was the key to unlocking this path of advancement and continued to play a role in the competition for success even among those who had already been certified as eligible for office. Those who purchased offices were given guarantees for appointments, an advantage that was afforded to no other group and opened up the possibility of hereditary office-holding among nationally prominent families.

Feminist scholars have argued that husband gender traditionalism is one of the root causes of spousal violence against women. Using couple-level data from Hong Kong ( N = 871 couples), this article argues that a second mechanism—couple gender value mismatch—also explains husband-to-wife physical assault. Our findings show that a husband’s gender traditionalism is positively associated with husband-to-wife physical assault only when the husband is coupled with a wife who has non-traditional gender attitudes. Similarly, egalitarian gender attitudes in wives are positively associated with husband-to-wife physical assault only when a non-traditional wife is coupled with a traditional husband.

This research examined the impact of network participation, social support, and social control on the violence victimization of female marriage migrants by a spouse. Data were from a household survey of 492 cross-border and 379 local married couples in Hong Kong in 2007. The findings indicated that female marriage migrants were more vulnerable to spousal violence and more socially isolated, compared with local women. Husbands of marriage migrants were also more socially isolated compared with men who married locally. The network participation of both husband and wife was associated positively with spousal violence against women, whereas their perceived social control was associated negatively with violence. Female marriage migrants' greater vulnerability to spousal physical assault was a result of their younger age compared with local women, but their greater vulnerability to spousal psychological aggression and sexual coercion was related, in part, to their own and their husbands' network participation as well as their level of social control.

Resource theory constitutes important explanations of spousal violence in culturally diverse societies. This article extends the theory by adding several subjective indicators: husband’s financial strain and the couple’s appraisal of each other’s financial and nonfinancial contributions to family. We examined the role of these subjective dimensions of resource in spousal violence against the backdrop of other predictors, including the husband’s absolute socioeconomic resources, the wife’s economic dependence, and relative resource differences between the husband and wife. The findings not only partly support absolute and relative resource theories but also suggest the salient role of subjective indicators of resources on husband-to-wife physical assault.

Previous research demonstrates that the risk, severity, and frequency of domestic violence vary considerably across social classes. Some studies show that couples from the lower class are more likely to experience husband-to-wife violence. Prior theoretical discussions have postulated that the relationship between husband’s economic resources and husband-to-wife physical assault is explained by husband’s attempt to gain and maintain power in the relationship. However, the mediating role of husband’s power motive is seldom empirically examined. The relationship between husband’s economic resources and husband-to-wife physical assault and its mediating mechanism are not entirely clear, especially in the Chinese context.