Cogent Psychology (Dec 2020)
Impact of environmental shocks on the preferred number of children of internal migrants: Evidence from China
Abstract
Most research has used individual or group features to explain why migrants have different preferred number of children. However, these features can be identified and subdivided infinitely, with none of them broadly answering the question “why migrants desire more or less children”? This paper identified “environmental shocks”, which are a common experience for all migrants, as determinants of dissimilar preferred number of children across internal migrants in China. Environmental shocks refer to the uncertainty experienced by physical and sociocultural changes in the environment. Environmental shocks were treated as a variable rather than a constant in the analysis because shocks may differ between migrants. By sampling the 1667 internal migrants who participated in China’s 2015 General Social Survey, a quantitative analysis revealed that a farther migration distance (meaning greater environmental shocks) leads to lower preferred number of children for migrants. However, the mitigation of environmental shocks by the period at the current residence has no significant influence. Semi-structured interviews conducted with internal migrants in China revealed that the time since migration could mitigate environmental shocks and increase desired number of children, but the time since migration brings other challenges that may decrease preferred number of children. This study improves our understanding of the determinants of migrants’ childbearing willingness and suggests that the government need to help weaken the impact of environmental shocks and uncertainties on migrants to prevent their preferred number of children from decreasing.
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