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 The
pregnancy was, as 26-year-old Liu Li says, “unexpected,”
the result of a malfunctioning contraceptive device. After some
thought, she decided to terminate it. “But,” recalls
Liu, “as I entered the hospital doors I felt the baby move
and changed my mind.”
Pregnancy, necessitating periodical ante-natal visits to the
Nanjing Maternity Hospital, did not unduly disrupt this math teacher
at Nanjing No. 3 High School’s lifestyle. Her husband’s
help with household chores enabled Liu to work almost right through
it, and neither of the pair was too tired to watch live footage
of the 2004 European Cup Final until the small hours.
Liu admits to being utterly unnerved after her baby’s delivery:
“… at the sight of that tiny, pink, crumpled-looking
creature that came to my screaming arms. I hardly dared touch
him for fear he might break.”
Liu is one of the first six million “one-child family”
children, born after implementation of the Single Child Policy
in the late 1970s, that are now of marriageable age. Since the
policy went into force, 80 million so-called “little emperors”
have been born, according to the Research Center for Population
Information based in Beijing. The center confirms that this demographic
trend will be maintained until “single-child” parents
constitute 71 percent of households in Beijing and 73 percent
of those in Shanghai by 2035.
Chen Gong, a demographics specialist at the Institute of Population
Research of Beijing University, believes that labeling single
children “little emperors,” implying that they are selfish,
lazy and spoilt ,is: “Unfair. An only child is bound to receive
more attention, but that does not necessarily mean he or she develops
such simplistic behavioral idiosyncrasies. The effect is more
complex than that.”
The aroma of milk and the sound of Liu Li’s son, Qian Che’s,
giggling and gurgling fills the living room. The tot lays on the
white sofa next to Liu Li, who is engrossed in the South Korean
TV soap opera Paris Lover. Liu Li’s mother, Wu Xiuqin, is
a 55-year-old retiree. She moved in with Liu six months ago and
says wearily, “Now I have two children to raise – a
daughter and a grandson.”
Differences in marriage and parental behaviors are found to exist
between “little emperors’” and their peers who
have siblings according to a 2004 survey carried out by the Youth
Research Center of the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. One
is that “onlies” depend, mentally, more on their parents.
Research into 1,828 couples aged 25-35, 39 percent of whom were
from single-child families, indicated that 18 percent of the latter
group had their weddings paid and their houses bought for them
by their parents. This was the case for just 10 percent of the
group with siblings. Also, half of the single-child adults still
lived with their parents, compared with only 28 percent of the
other group that had failed to leave the nest.
Sociologists are confused by this phenomenon; when a nation’s
economy develops the extended family normally begins to be supplanted
by the nuclear family, according to Bao Leiping of the Research
Center for Population Information. This has not happened, Bao
believes, because “adult little emperors get their parents
to move in with them and look after their grandchildren. This
causes conflict between the two adult generations as to traditional
and new approaches to child rearing.”
Liu Li’s husband, Qian Qian, also a single child, is all
too aware of such differences of opinion; he hears his wife and
mother-in-law bickering about the rights and wrongs of bathing
baby Qian Che every night. He gives another example: “When
my son was two months old, my mother-in-law wanted to supplement
mother’s milk by giving him wheat rusks. But my wife was
dead against this because she had read on the Internet that infants
should not feed on other than milk until four months old. My mother-in-law
gave in in the end.”
About 46 percent of “little emperor” generation parents
look on the Internet for information on child-raising, as compared
to 39 percent of those with siblings, while 76 percent refer to
books and magazines rather than ask their parents.
Yet Liu Li admits that she would be lost without her mother’s
help, and that when Wu goes home at weekends baby Qian Che smiles
less and cries more.
Too much dependence on grandmother can compromise a young mother’s
ability to raise a child, warns Bao Leiping: “By letting
the grandmother take care of the most basic needs of feeding and
changing, the mother risks forfeiting a key bond with her child.”
But, on the other hand, sharing the caring exposes the child to
both traditional and modern approaches to learning, which, Bao
admits, “… does have its advantages.”
Liu intends to accept her mother’s help looking after Qian
Che until he is one year old. She will then send him into day
care where he can interact with other children under professional
care. Recalling her own childhood, when: “No one played with
me and my parents were always busy,” Liu is determined that
her son will not experience similar loneliness.
Research also indicates that sibling-less children tend to date
earlier. About 34 percent of the Shanghai “only-child”
group started going out on dates at younger than 20, as compared
to 8 percent of the fraternal group, and 13 percent of “onlies”
compared with 11 percent of the other group, had experienced premarital
sex.
All couples surveyed were agreed that marriage is a choice rather
than a duty, and the majority preferred late marriage. There was
also consensus on the concept of bearing a child to bring joy
rather than to continue the family line.
Liu Li’s husband, engineer Qian Qian, says that he feels
conscious of the need to “play with the baby.” This
is an activity single-child parents appear to enjoy more than
those with siblings, and 74 percent of the former, compared with
66 percent of the latter would buy themselves mind-stimulating
toys, such as jigsaw puzzles or Rubik’s cubes while they
did for their children.
“This,” says Bao Leiping”, “indicates that
sibling-less parents are more self-conscious as a result of their
deep-rooted concept of independence and equity, and are less likely
to spoil their children.”
Mother-in-law Wu is not impressed.
“Both Liu Li and Qian Qian are single children. Neither
of them knows how to cook, never mind how to look after a baby,”
she says. “I have to help them look after my grandson, and
cook for them too.” But one day, Liu and Qian might find
themselves looking after Wu and three other elderly parents.
“That is a burdensome situation for a young couple with
one, or perhaps two, children,” says Bao Leiping. Chen Gong
is dismissive of these concerns. He is confident that: “As
society develops, more social resources will be earmarked for
the support of the elderly, so that they will no longer need to
depend on their children to look after them. We already have community
services, and in the future more welfare institutions will participate
in senior citizen support.”
Despite the level of help she received from her mother in raising
her son, Liu Li says the experience has made her more mature.
“In the past six months we have learned a lot through our
baby, and I believe that in the future we’ll continue to
grow, together.”
RONG JIAOJIAO is a reporter with China Features.
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