The purpose of this study is to identify the influencing factors related to the marriage view and marriage intention of unmarried Korean and Chinese male and female college students residing in metropolitan areas, and to compare the similarities and d...
The purpose of this study is to identify the influencing factors related to the marriage view and marriage intention of unmarried Korean and Chinese male and female college students residing in metropolitan areas, and to compare the similarities and differences between male and female college students in the two countries. To this end, a survey was conducted on male and female college students attending universities in Seoul, Korea and Beijing, China, and the responses of 440 participants were used for the analysis. For the measurements, the Marriage view Scale, the Gender Role Perception Scale, the Parent Marital Relationship Scale, and the Parent-Child Relationship Scale were used. For statistical analysis, SPSS 24.0 program was used for descriptive statistics, reliability test, T-test, chi-square, ANOVA, Pearson's correlation, multiple regression analysis, and logistic regression analysis. The results were as follows.
First, the tendency of marriage view, Korean college students, especially males, showed high in the stable-romantic view of marriage, while Chinese students, especially female, showed low. Chinese students, especially male, showed high in the conservative-instrumental view of marriage, whereas Korean students, especially female, showed low, showing a difference from the other three groups. In the negative-exclusive view of marriage, Korean students, especially male, showed the highest, but Chinese students, especially male, showed the lowest. Regarding marriage intentions, Korean students are less likely to marry than Chinese male and female college students. Korean male (57.7%), Chinese male (76.3%), and Chinese female (72.3%) were more likely to have an intention to marry, and Korean female were more likely to answer 'I don't know' (39.6%). Korean college students have relatively more stable-romantic views than Chinese but they are less likely to marry than Chinese. In particular, the intention to marry Korean female students is significantly lower than that of Korean male.
Second, the socio-demographic variables, individual variables, and family environment variables showed differences between the two countries in terms of religion, only child or not, whether parents lived together, parents' educational background, and family income. In the gender role perception, which is an individual variable, Chinese students, especially male, showed a relatively conservative gender role perception, but Korean, especially female, showed a relatively progressive gender role perception. In the family environment variable, most of the participants had never experienced parental divorce. The psychological harmony perceived about parental marital relationships was higher in Chinese students than in Korean.
Third, in Korean male students, the parental marital relationship and the relationship with mother had a positive effect on the conservative-instrumental view of marriage and the passive-exclusive view of marriage. In the case of Korean female students, family income, marital relationship of parents, and relationship with mother had a positive effect on conservative-instrumental view of marriage and passive-exclusive view of marriage.
In the case of Chinese male students, conservative gender role perception, parental divorce, parental marital relationship and relationship with mother had positive effects on stable-romantic marriage view, and mother's educational background had negative effects on conservative-instrumental view and passive-exclusive view of marriage, while conservative gender role perception, parental marital relationship and relationship with mother had positive effects on the conservative-instrumental view and the passive-exclusive view of marriage. In the case of Chinese female students, conservative gender role perception and relationship with mother had a positive effect on stability-romantic view of marriage, and religion had positive effects on conservative-instrumental view and passive-exclusive view of marriage, while conservative gender role perception, parental marital relationship and relationship with mother had positive effects on the conservative-instrumental view and the passive-exclusive view of marriage.
In this study, demographic variables (family income) of Korean male students had a negative effect on their intention not to marry. In the case of Korean female, the better the relationship with their mother, the weaker their intention not to marry. In the case of Chinese male, the more progressive gender role perception, the stronger the intention not to marry. For Chinese female, the progressive gender role perception, parental divorce, and the rigid relationship with the mother increased the intention of not to marry.
The findings of this study need to be interpreted under the limitation of generalization because the data was only collected two cities in two countries. In addition, for Korean college students, the regression model describing the stable-romantic marriage view was not significant, which may be the limitation of the marriage view scale used in this study and indicates the need to explore more diverse variables for the dependent variable.