Page 211 - 《社会》2025年第1期

社会·2025·1

YU Jiaqing HU Anning XUE Sen
Abstract：While research on filial piety often emphasizes the unidirectional
relationship from children to parents， intergenerational ties are inherently
bidirectional. Changes in parental recognition of filial piety ethics not only
illuminate their role expectations of their children but also serves as an important
entry point for understanding the overall changes in traditional Chinese filial piety.
This study proposes a family analysis framework that incorporates gender roles to
explore the micro -foundation and social context underpinning the transformation of
filial piety in China. Drawing on data from the 2014 China Family Panel Studies
（CFPS）， we leverage the exogenous variation in firstborn gender to identify its
causal effects on parental binary filial piety recognition. On average， parents of
daughters exhibit weaker endorsement of authoritarian filial piety yet show stronger
recognition of reciprocal filial piety compared to parents of sons. This pattern arises
from two key mechanisms. First， daughters’ post鄄marital patrilocal residence
disrupts traditional intergenerational co鄄residence arrangements， thereby
diminishing parental adherence to authoritarian filial piety norms. Second， adult
daughters are more likely to provide caregiving support during their parents’
illnesses， fulfilling emotional expectations for affection and fostering greater parental
recognition of reciprocal filial piety. Additionally， the declining fertility rates over
the past four decades have brought about a significant shift in the gender
composition of children， with families only having daughters becoming increasingly
more common. Given that parents with only daughters exhibit lower recognition of
authoritarian filial piety， this helps explain why there has been a decline in societal
recognition of traditional filial piety ethics. By analyzing the changes in parental role
expectations and ethical recognition， this study not only sheds light on the
mechanisms driving the transformation and development of traditional Chinese
culture but also offers a deeper understanding of the reconstruction of family ethics
in the context of fertility transition.
Keywords：transformation of filial piety， dual filial piety model， children’s
gender， role expectation， fertility transition

一、 引言

无论是基于何种学科背景和理论立场， 研究者都大体同意孝道是
中国传统儒家文化下一套与角色、关系密切相关的伦理观念（叶光辉、

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