Living in skipped generation households and happiness among middle-aged and older grandparents in China

Social Science Research 80 (2019) 145–155

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Living in skipped generation households and happiness among middle-aged and older grandparents in China

T

Ming Wena, Qiang Renb,∗, Kim Korineka, Ha N. Trinhc a

Department of Sociology, University of Utah, 380 S 1530 E Rm 301, Salt Lake City, UT, 84112, USA Center for Social Research/Institute of Social Science Survey, Peking University, Science Bldg. #5, Room 633, Yiheyuan Road #5, Haidian District, Beijing, 100871, China c Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Women's Health, University of Texas Medical Branch, 301 University Blvd, Galveston, TX, 77555, USA b

A R T IC LE I N F O

ABS TRA CT

Keywords: Living arrangements Mental health Rural-urban migration Middle-aged Aging China

This study examines whether living in skipped-generation households (SGHs) is prospectively linked to happiness among middle-aged and older grandparents in China and explores the moderating effects of age, gender, education, income and rural-urban status on this link. The analyses use the two most recent waves of data (collected in 2012 and 2014) from the China Family Panel Studies. The outcome is a continuous, single-item happiness scale composed of data taken from the latter wave, while the key predictor is a categorical measurement of the respondents’ living arrangements in 2012. The analyses use ordinary least squares (OLS) linear regression analyses to assess the relationship between the two variables of interest. Overall, grandparents living in SGHs are less happy than those living only with a spouse or those living in three-generation households. Age group and rural-urban status are found to be significant moderators. The negative link between living in SGHs and happiness is largely absent in the oldest age group (i.e., age 70 or above) and among urban dwellers.

1. Introduction In skipped-generation households (SGHs),1 grandparents, living either alone or with a spouse, raise at least one grandchild in the absence of his or her parents (Pebley and Rudkin, 1999). In other words, SGHs consist of only grandparents and grandchildren. The population of middle-aged and older adults living in SGHs in China has increased dramatically since the beginning of the country's reform and opening era in the late 1970s. This increase is related to the large-scale rural-to-urban migration of young parents spurred by economic opportunities in the cities and has been facilitated by more relaxed migration policies (Huang, 2006). Meanwhile, the Chinese cities have also seen a rise in SGH prevalence. According to the 2010 census in China, among elder SGHs defined as SGHs where grandparents were 60 years old or older, 13.7% of, were in cities, 17.2% were in towns, and 69.1% were in villages (Zhang, 2013). How this new demographic trend has impacted the country's grandparents who are providing full-time care for their grandchildren is largely unknown (Silverstein et al., 2007). Compared to a flourishing literature on children left-behind by their parents away from home and working in cities (called ‘hukou’ in Chinese) (Wen and Lin, 2012), far less research is focused on the rural Chinese grandparents who stay behind, many of whom assume a proxy parental role. To fill in this knowledge gap, the present study aims to examine the implications of living in SGHs for grandparents’ subjective

∗

Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (Q. Ren). 1 Skipped generation household is abbreviated as SGH from here on. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2019.01.004 Received 5 December 2017; Received in revised form 30 November 2018; Accepted 10 January 2019 Available online 11 January 2019 0049-089X/ © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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wellbeing and explore the moderating effects of several socio-demographic factors to gain understanding of the specificity of this relationship. Using data from a recent, nationally representative longitudinal survey in China, this study complements the large number of western studies on the role of grandparents in caring for their grandchildren and presents timely evidence that speaks to several main theories on living arrangements and healthy aging. 1.1. Subjective wellbeing, positive affect and happiness As a hallmark of subjective wellbeing, positive affect refers to rewarding affective experiences, such as pleasant feelings and moods (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005). Research on positive affect has received increased attention over the past two decades in Western societies in part due to the momentum of the positive psychology movement (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000) and the growing recognition of the multi-level and multi-dimensional benefits of positive affect (Salsman et al., 2014). For example, beneficial effects of positive affect have been documented for mental, physical, functional and cognitive health (Hirosaki et al., 2013; Petrie et al., 2018; Pressman and Cohen, 2005; Steptoe and Wardle, 2011; Van der Stigchel et al., 2011), desirable psychological outcomes such as resilience, endurance, and optimism (Nath and Pradhan, 2012; Salovey et al., 2000), larger social rewards in terms of more and closer social contacts (Cohen and Pressman, 2006), and socioeconomic success (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005). Apart from these external benefits, positive affect is a desirable and worthy goal in its own right not only because of its salience and significance as a dimension of a good life for the individual, but also because it contributes to better-functioning families, healthier communities, and more productive societies (Lyubomirsky et al., 2005). Promoting positive affect is particularly important for a rapidly aging society like China, as the link between emotional wellbeing and health is more pronounced at older ages, insofar as biological frailty naturally increases along with advancing age (Steptoe et al., 2015). As life expectancy increases worldwide, the issue of promoting positive affect and achieving successful aging is growing in importance (Steptoe et al., 2015). Understanding what and how social processes promote or deter positive affect formation is a prerequisite for developing effective intervention to increase positive affect. Happiness is arguably the most important component of positive affect, described as “the experience of joy, contentment, or positive wellbeing, combined with a sense that one's life is good, meaningful, and worthwhile” by positive psychologist Sonja Lyubormirsky (2007). According to this definition, happiness is a combination of how good you feel (i.e., positive emotions) on a dayto-day basis and how satisfied you are with your life (i.e., life satisfaction). Happiness is subjective, internalized experience. A large body of literature shows that happiness is linked to desirable life outcomes in many domains, ranging from supportive social relationships and socioeconomic success to physical and mental health and longevity (Cohn et al., 2009). In this study, we focus on happiness as the main outcome and a key indicator of positive affect and subjective wellbeing. 1.2. Living arrangements and wellbeing in later life Across a myriad of social environmental factors of health, living arrangement is among the most examined predictor for subjective wellbeing of older adults (Weissman and Russell, 2018; Yamada and Teerawichitchainan, 2015). This research is important given that the household represents the most immediate social context to which community-dwelling adults are exposed on a daily basis (Rogers et al., 2000). The social environment formed by the co-residential family members may be more salient to health than less proximate environments (Hughes and Waite, 2002). That said, the health and aging literature has largely been focused on one type of intergenerational coresidence, namely residence of an elderly person with his or her adult child and/or the child's family (Ruggles, 2011), while largely ignoring other forms of intergenerational coresidence such as living in SGHs, an increasingly prevalent form of living for middle-aged and older adults in China. 1.2.1. Living in SGHs and emotional status: a complex relationship There is no theoretical consensus on how living in SGHs affects grandparents’ emotional status. On the one hand, caring for grandchildren without help from their parents can be physically demanding and psychologically stressful. Raising a child comes with major responsibilities, especially for non-parent guardians. For grandchildren in middle childhood or adolescence, in the absence of the parents, effective grandparenting takes more than being around and providing food and shelter; rather, it entails more sophisticated, constructive grandparenting behaviors, such as engaging in schoolwork, offering emotional support, and providing appropriate supervision. These demands can exert considerable emotional stress on grandparents, who are essentially acting as surrogate parents to their grandchildren. Consequently, the psychological burdens associated with living in SGHs can lead to the formation of negative affect. This view is consistent with the role strain theory, which contends that intense role obligations can act as chronic stressors that lead individuals to feel overwhelmed and psychologically compromised due to role overload (e.g., demands exceed capacities, resulting in deficiency in social and emotional resources) and inter-role conflict (e.g., the demands of multiple roles are incompatible with one another) (Goode, 1960; Mui, 1992). On the other hand, living in SGHs can offer psychological benefits for Chinese grandparents. An important cause of the formation of SGHs is the out-migration of the middle generation, a phenomenon particularly prevalent in rural China. Such middle-generation, rural migrant workers generally feel obligated to send remittances to provide for the welfare of those back home. This financial help is not only economically beneficial, but can also promote a sense of financial security and enhance the levels of parental satisfaction for grandparents. Providing care for grandchildren is also culturally normative in China (Zimmer et al., 2010), as an extended filial obligation downstream from the older generation to the younger generation, and also as a way for elders to ensure old-age reciprocal support from their adult children and grandchildren in their late stages of life. This relational pattern is particularly predominant in 146

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rural China, where the family is the primary source of old-age care and where pension systems and other public support for rural Chinese elders is weak or absent (Silverstein et al., 2007). Moreover, it can be intrinsically rewarding and psychologically fulfilling for grandparents to make important contributions to their extended family. In addition, cross-generational support is typically reciprocal, such that grandchildren are simultaneously providing companionship and social, instrumental (e.g., help with household chores) and emotional support for their grandparents (Korinek et al., 2011; Zeng and Wang, 2003). These benefits, if confirmed, would lend support for the role enhancement perspective, emphasizing the potential positive consequences of occupying multiple roles on mental wellbeing via mechanisms such as increased social integration, which likely result in increases in “power, prestige, resources, and emotional gratification, including social recognition and a heightened sense of identity” (Moen et al., 1995, p.260). 1.2.2. Living in SGHs and emotional status: moderating effects The conceptual complexities inherent in the emotional significance of SGH-living for grandparents lend support to competing hypotheses regarding the relationship between SGH-living and emotional status. Moreover, the psychological impact of SGH-living may vary according to demographic factors such as age and gender, as well as socioeconomic factors like income, education and rural-urban status. In general, due to the physical and emotional demands incurred by the primary caregiver of grandchildren, we expect that the burden (that is, the negative aspects) of being a proxy parent are less salient when the grandparent in question has more resources as his or her disposal. Defined broadly, such resources can include both financial and social capital. Therefore, we hypothesize that the net effect of SGH-living is most detrimental for the oldest age group or those grandparents with relatively lower income. In addition, holding age and economic resources constant, SGH-living may have a more positive effect on rural grandparents than it does on urban grandparents due to the former's having a stronger sense of collective familism and greater motivation to invest in adult children in exchange for old-age support, especially given the rural elders' greater need to rely upon adult as they age (Silverstein et al., 2007). Grandparents of rural origin can be further categorized into two subgroups: those living in rural areas versus those living in urban areas as rural-to-urban migrants. How to form a priori hypotheses regarding how these two rural subgroups of grandparents would fare when living in SGHs is less theoretically straightforward. The choice theory, posited as a framework to understand levels of satisfaction among grandparents who act as regular childcare providers, may shed insight upon this conundrum (Goodfellow and Laverty, 2003). This theory contends that the degree of satisfaction grandparents experience in their role as grandchild-care provider is related to the nature of their choices, including dimensions such as ‘retirement choices versus intergenerational responsibilities’ and ‘freedom to pursue one's own interests versus fulfilling familial obligations.’ In other words, this theory predicts that grandparents who have other abundant options of postretirement leisure activities, but are constrained in caregiving responsibilities and therefore cannot pursue their own interests, will be less satisfied in their care-giving roles (Goh, 2009). According to this framework, the effect of living in SGHs on the grandparents' positive affect might be more negative for rural grandparents living in rural areas than it is for rural grandparents living in cities as temporary migrants because the former may have more readily available entertaining options (e.g., playing Mahjong) than the latter, who tend to have fewer choices to make in terms of daily activities because they may have fewer friends in the new urban community. Taken together, it follows that the effect of living in SGHs on positive affect is more detrimental for urban grandparents than for rural grandparents, with the rural-to-urban migrant grandparents being the least affected by the negative sides of living in SGHs. Education can be another moderator of the association between SGH-living and older adults’ positive affect. Ethnographic evidence suggests that grandparents with relatively low education levels tend to enjoy a greater sense of esteem and pride by living lives that revolve around their grandchildren. On the other hand, grandparents with relatively high education and income levels are more likely to raise grievances about losing freedom and missing post-retirement opportunities due to intergenerational obligations (Goh, 2009). This argument is in line with the role conflict theory and the choice theory considering that social class is positively linked to more active aging and increased opportunity costs of full-time grand-parenting for high-SES grandparents. Regarding gender, living in SGHs may also take a greater toll upon grandfathers than upon grandmothers because Chinese women have traditionally taken on caregiving roles to a greater extent than have Chinese men. This gender-based pattern remains strong today, consistent with the normative gender role expectations and the patrilineal and patriarchal tradition in China (Silverstein et al., 2006). 1.2.3. Mixed findings from previous studies Grandparents caring for grandchildren is not unique to China; on the contrary, it has been widely observed in Western societies as well. In the United States, for example, 24% of preschoolers are regularly cared for by their grandparents (Laughlin, 2013). Moreover, Hank and Buber (2009) found that 58% of grandmothers and 49% of grandfathers provided some kind of care for a grandchild ages 15 or younger during a 12-month period in ten European countries including Austria, Denmark, France, Greece, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, and Spain. Additional research conducted in Western societies on grandchild care has identified significant variations in the prevalence and intensity of care and subsequent health consequences of various types of grandchild care. While some studies showed that occasional or supplementary care is beneficial to grandparents’ health (Arpino and Bordone, 2014; Grundy et al., 2012; Ku et al., 2013; Tsai et al., 2013), others documented detrimental effects on health and health behavior of intensive grandchild caring provided by grandparents living in SGHs (Chen and Liu, 2012; Hughes et al., 2007; Mills et al., 2005). The emotional health effects of living in SGHs in the Chinese setting have yet to be adequately examined. Most studies on living arrangements and wellbeing among older adults in China have not focused on grandparents per se. In particular, middle-aged grandparents are typically not included in this scholarship. The limited research on this topic has produced inconsistent findings. For example, Chen and Liu (2012) conducted a longitudinal analysis of a panel data collected from 1991 to 2006 to examine the health 147

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implications of grandparents aged 60 or older caring for grandchildren in China. Their findings suggest that grandparents living in SGHs as compared to other living arrangements did not suffer from a deficit in self-reported health. By contrast, Ren and Treiman (2015) used the baseline CFPS data collected in 2010 to examine the consequences of Chinese older adults’ living arrangements for their emotional wellbeing. This study concluded that Chinese elders living in SGHs were less happy, less satisfied, and more depressed than independent elderly couples not living with any offspring or those living in three-generation households. Meanwhile, qualitative research has reported divergent patterns of association between grandparents' emotional status and their involvement in caring for grandchildren, providing detailed explanations as to why divergent emotional consequences may result from the same living arrangement (Goh, 2009). Essentially, how grandparents fare emotionally when living in SGHs depends on the grandparent's lifestyle preference, the availability of choices for post-retirement time, and their perceptions of intrinsic and external rewards derived from providing grandchild care for their adult children. 1.3. Study purposes Given the previous theoretical and empirical developments, the purpose of this study is three-fold. First, we examine the age and rural-urban composition of SGH-living Chinese grandparents by computing their prevalence rates and their temporal transition patterns. Second, we explore how living in SGHs, as compared to other major types of living arrangements, is associated with positive affect in China. Third, we investigate the moderating effects of age, gender, education, family income, and rural-urban status on the SGH-living and positive affect association. We hypothesize that living in SGHs is significantly associated with grandparents’ emotional wellbeing. The magnitude and direction of this relationship remain to be an empirical question however due to the conflicting theoretical expectations and inconsistent findings reported in prior empirical work. 2. Methods 2.1. Data For our analyses, we used the two most recent waves of data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) collected in 2012 and 2014. The CFPS is a longitudinal and nationally representative study conducted by the Institutes of Social Science Survey (ISSS) of Peking University in collaboration with the Survey Research Center at the University of Michigan. First launched in 2010, the CFPS focuses on a wide range of economic and non-economic themes, including three surveys that collect information on individuals, households, and communities across China. The family members and any children born to or adopted by them before age ten identified at baseline in the future are treated as CFPS gene members and will be tracked throughout their lives; theoretically they can only leave the surveys through death. The cross-sectional response rate for each wave is 74% in 2012 and 73% in 2014. The successful-tracking rate between the two waves is 83.8% (Xie et al., 2017). Our analyses mainly relied on the individual data, which contained more than 30,000 participants age 18 years and older. We also utilized the household data of about 15,000 households to generate the variables of living arrangement and family income. Among these CFPS participants, grandparents who were 50 years old or older, taking care of grandchildren younger than 16 years old, not living with their own elderly parents, and not urban-to-rural migrants (a small subgroup) were selected for present study. After excluding missing values and attrition across the two waves, our analytical sample included 4006 CFPS participants. 2.2. Measures 2.2.1. Dependent variable Using data collected in 2014, we used a single-item measure of happiness to capture positive affect. The measure was based on responses to the question of “How happy do you feel you are?” Response categories ranged from very unhappy (1) to very happy (10). Previous work has shown the single item measuring happiness has good psychometric properties; for instance, the correlations between the single item and both the Oxford Happiness Inventory (Argyle et al., 1989; Hills and Argyle, 2002) and the Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener et al., 1985; Pavot and Diener, 1993) were highly significant and positive (Abdel-Khalek, 2006). 2.2.2. Key independent variable We created a living arrangement variable from the 2012 and 2014 data, including four categories: living in SGHs (reference group), living alone, living with spouse only (no offspring in the household), living in three-generation households (living with at least one adult child or child in-law and one grandchild), and other living arrangements. SGH was defined as the household where at least one grandparent, regardless of whether living with a spouse, lived with at least one grandchild aged 15 or younger and without any grown children or grown children-in-law present in the household. We also created a variable to indicate the SGH-living change from 2012 to 2014. 2.2.3. Other independent variables In our analyses, we controlled for participants’ age, gender (male vs female), marital status (currently married vs currently not married), number of children alive (capped at five), age of the youngest grandchild, rural-urban status, education, family income, and selfrated health, all measured from the 2014 data (given the strong possibility that emotional status is primarily influenced by current conditions, we have chosen to measure the control variables concurrently with the outcome variables). Age was categorized into 148

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three groups including 50–59, 60–69, 70 or older. Following previous work (Chen and Liu, 2012; Ren and Treiman, 2015), age 60 was used as the cutoff point for distinguishing the middle-aged and the elderly population, as it reflects the standard retirement age for male workers in China (for women it is age 50 for ordinary workers and 55 for civil servants). Education was measured in five categories, including illiterate/semi-literate; primary school, junior high school, senior high school, and some college or above. Annual family income was grouped into three categories including 25,000 yuan or below, between 25,000 and 50,000 yuan, and greater than 50,000 yuan. Family income includes labor and non-labor income, expenditures in different categories, and incomegenerating activities of all family members (Xie and Lu, 2015). One yuan is equal to 0.14 US dollar based on current exchange rate. Rural-urban status was categorized into three groups including urban hukou and urban residence (i.e., urban natives), rural hukou and urban residence (i.e., rural-to-urban migrants), and rural hukou and rural residence (i.e., rural natives). Self-rated health was indicated by five categories, ranging from unhealthy to very healthy, with higher scores indicating healthier status. Among these independent variables, age, gender, rural-urban status, education and family income were examined as both control variables and moderators. 2.3. Statistical analyses We first performed t-tests, ANOVA and Pearson's correlation analysis to examine bivariate relationship between happiness and each covariate. We then ran ordinary least squares (OLS) linear regression models to test the main effects of living in SGHs compared to other living arrangements on happiness as well as the interaction effects between living arrangement and age, gender, education, family income, and rural-urban origin and residence. Among the five moderators we examined, only age and rural-urban status exhibited significant interaction effects. We thus conducted OLS linear regression modeling separately for the age and rural-urban subgroups in addition to the analyses on the whole sample. To test the model robustness, we reran all the regression models using the 2012 variables as the controls; the results remained entirely consistent. Multicollinearity testing was performed and no alarming collinearity problem was detected. 3. Results 3.1. Descriptive results Table 1 presents sample statistics of living arrangements in 2012 and 2014 and all the other variables included in the analyses measured in 2014. The mean level of happiness reported in 2014 is 7.5 with a 2.2 standard deviation. The frequency distributions of living arrangements in the two years are similar, with the most prevalent form of living arrangement being three-generation living together (67.4% in 2012 and 63.6% in 2014) and the least common being living alone (1.6% in 2012; 2.4% in 2014). In 2012, 759 middle-aged and older grandparents sampled in CFPS (19%) lived in SGHs, of which 428 (about 58%) still lived in SGHs two years later, while 331 (about 42%) had moved out of the SGH-living arrangement by the time of the 2014 survey. Meanwhile, among the 3247 participants who did not live in SGHs in 2012, 274 moved into an SGH living arrangement in 2014, among whom 224, or 82%, were living in three-generation-households in 2012. It is intriguing to see this high level of transition into or out of SGH-living within just two years, yet no information is provided by the CFPS regarding specific reasons for living arrangement changes across time. Presumably changes in the family needs and grandparents' health are among the major triggers for grandparents' moving into or out of the SGH-living arrangement. As discussed earlier, a primary reason leading to SGH-living in China is adult children's rural-to-urban migration fueled by industrialization and urbanization. However, this type of migration is neither permanent nor static but often temporary and sometimes recurrent. Health reasons are also plausible. If grandparents substantially suffer from deteriorating physical or functional health, they are likely to become considerably less able to act as primary caregivers and proxy parents for their grandchildren. In any event, the high prevalence of SGH-living is evidenced in that about one out of five in this national sample of grandparents age 50 or older lived in SGHs in at least one of the two survey years. Among the 759 participants who lived in SGHs in 2012, age 60–69 is the mode (54.7%), and the oldest group constitutes the smallest share of the analytical sample (18.7%). As to rural-urban status, 17.1% have urban hukou, 15.8% have rural hukou but live in urban areas, and 67.1% have rural hukou and live in rural areas. Clearly, SGH-living is predominantly, but not exclusively, a rural phenomenon. The age distribution is similar in the whole sample with the majority of the grandparents in this study belonging to the age group of 60–69 years. The gender distribution is skewed toward having more women (53.5%) than men (46.5%), which is consistent with the demographic pattern of greater life expectancy among women as compared to men. The majority of the sampled middle-aged and older adults (83.6%) are married, and on average, the average number of living adult children is about two at the time of the 2014 CFPS survey. The average youngest grandchild in the house is nine years old. In terms of socioeconomic status, the majority of the sample are rural natives or rural-to-urban migrants (78.6%), with below senior high school education (90.9%); the modal family annual income category is 50,000 yuan or above (44.5%). The average self-rated health score is 2.6, falling in somewhere between the ‘fair’ and ‘somewhat healthy’ categories, with a 1.2 standard deviation. Table 2a shows the mean and standard deviation of happiness for categorical covariates along with the significance level from the t-test or ANOVA test assessing whether the means of two groups (i.e., t-test) or more than two groups (i.e., ANOVA) are statistically different from each other. SGH-living corresponds to the lowest happiness level compared to all the other living arrangements. In terms of the 2012 to 2014 transition in SGH-living, those not living in SGHs in either wave are the happiest and the least happy group 149

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Table 1 Sample statistics. Variables

Percentage/Mean (SD)

Dependent variable Happiness in 2014 (1 very unhappy to 10 very happy)

7.5 (2.2)

Key independent variable Living arrangement in 2012 Skipped-generation households (SGH) Living alone Living with spouse Three generations living together Others Living arrangement in 2014 Skipped-generation households (SGH) Living alone Living with spouse Three generation living together Others 2012–2014 change in living in SGH Not in SGH in either wave Not in SGH in 2012 but in SGH in 2014 Not in SGH in 2014 but in SGH in 2012 In SGH in both waves Among those living in SHG in 2012 (N = 759) Age 50–59 years Age 60–69 years Age 70 + years Urban hukou and urban residence (urban natives) Rural hukou and urban residence (migrants) Rural hukou and rural residence (rural natives)

26.6% 54.7% 18.7% 17.1% 15.8% 67.1%

Key moderators Age group in 2014 Age 50–59 years Age 60–69 years Age 70 + years

31.2% 47.8% 21.0%

Urban-rural hukou and residence in 2014 Urban hukou and urban residence (urban natives) Rural hukou and urban residence (migrants) Rural hukou and rural residence (rural natives)

21.4% 19.6% 59.0%

18.9% 1.6% 7.4% 67.4% 4.7% 17.5% 2.4% 11.4% 63.6% 5.1% 74.2% 6.8% 8.3% 10.7%

Control variables Male Currently married in 2014 Age of the youngest grandchild Number of children alive in 2014 (1–5+) Education (no difference between 2012 and 2014) Illiterate/Semi-literate Primary school Junior high school Senior high school Some college or above Annual family income in 2014 ≤25,000 yuan > 25,000 & ≤ 25,000 yuan > 50,000 yuan Self-rated health in 2014 (1 = very unhealthy to 5 = healthy)

46.5% 83.6% 9.4 (6.8) 2.1 (1.0) 53.9% 19.1% 17.9% 8.1% 1.00% 29.8% 25.7% 44.5% 2.6 (1.2)

Sample size = 4006.

consists of those living in SGHs in both waves. These group differences are both statistically significant (p < 0.001). Urban background (p < 0.001), higher education (p < 0.05), and higher income (p < 0.001) are also linked to higher levels of happiness. Table 2b presents correlation coefficients of happiness with three additional covariates either continuous or ordinal treated as numerical variables. Happiness is positively correlated with the age of the youngest grandchild and self-rated health with p-values both smaller than 0.05 based on Pearson's correlation analysis. That is, the older the youngest grandchild and the better self-rated health, the happier.

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Table 2a Mean and standard deviation of happiness for categorical covariates. Variables Living arrangement in 2012∗∗∗ Skipped-generation households (SGH) Living alone Living with spouse Three generation living together Others 2012–2014 change in living in SGH∗∗∗ Not in SGH in either wave Not in SGH in 2012 but in SGH in 2014 Not in SGH in 2014 but in SGH in 2012 In SGH in both waves Age group Age 50–59 years Age 60–69 years Age 70 + years Rural-urban status∗∗∗ Urban hukou and urban residence (urban natives) Rural hukou and urban residence (migrants) Rural hukou and rural residence (rural natives) Gender Male Female Marital status Currently married Currently not married Education level∗ Illiterate/Semi-literate Primary school Junior high school Senior high school Some college or above Annual family income∗∗∗ ≤25,000 yuan > 25,000 & ≤ 25,000 yuan > 50,000 yuan

Mean

SD

7.1 7.4 7.5 7.6 7.4

2.2 2.5 2.3 2.2 2.2

7.6 7.3 7.2 7.1

2.2 2.4 2.2 2.2

7.4 7.5 7.6

2.2 2.2 2.2

8.0 7.6 7.3

1.9 2.2 2.3

7.6 7.5

2.0 2.3

7.5 7.4

2.2 2.4

7.4 7.6 7.7 7.6 7.7

2.4 2.0 1.9 1.9 1.3

7.2 7.5 7.8

2.4 2.3 2.0

Sample size = 4006; *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001. Table 2b Correlation matrix of happiness with continuous covariates. Happiness Number of living children Age of the youngest grandchild Self-rated health (1–5)

0.02 0.07∗ 0.19∗

Sample size = 4006; *p < 0.05.

3.2. Results from OLS linear regression Table 3 presents the OLS linear regression results predicting happiness in 2014 from living arrangements measured in 2012 while controlling for potential confounders measured in 2014. The first two models are both run on the whole sample. Model 1 compares SGH-living with all the other living arrangements combined in their association with happiness, finding that grandparents living in SGHs are significantly less happy (coefficient = −0.35; p < 0.001) than the other grandparents. Model 2 examines more nuanced group difference. The result shows that grandparents living with spouse (coefficient = 0.35; p < 0.05) or living in three-generation households (coefficient = 0.37; p < 0.001) report significantly higher levels of happiness than SGH-living grandparents. No statistically significant difference is detected between SGH-living and solo-living in the whole sample. Models 3 through 5 present the results from the age-specific analyses. The results reveal that the younger elderly group (age 60–69) exhibits the strongest living arrangement effects among the three age groups with living alone (coefficient = 1.21; p < 0.01), living with spouse (coefficient = 0.41; p < 0.10; marginal significance), and living in a three-generation household (coefficient = 0.43; p < 0.01) all linked to greater levels of happiness compared to SGH-living. For the middle-aged (age 50 to 59), living with spouse (coefficient = 0.58; p < 0.05) or in three-generation households (coefficient = 0.39; p < 0.01) also show significant 151

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Table 3 Linear regression of happiness on living arrangement (whole sample, age subgroups, rural-urban subgroups). Variables

Living in skipped-generation householdsa Living alone

Model 1

Model 2

Model 3

Model 4

Model 5

Model 6

Model 7

Model 8

Whole sample

Whole sample

Age 50–59

Age 60–69

Age 70+

Urban natives

Rural-urban migrants

Rural natives

−0.350*** (0.092)

Reference

Reference

Reference

Reference

Reference

Reference

Reference

0.330 (0.308) 0.353* (0.152) 0.365*** (0.094) 0.153 (0.181)

−0.365 (0.536) 0.584* (0.254) 0.389** (0.150) 0.495* (0.251)

1.214** (0.470) 0.409+ (0.217) 0.425** (0.139) −0.060 (0.337)

−0.175 (0.568) −0.277 (0.403) 0.130 (0.263) −0.353 (0.424)

0.593 (0.641) 0.281 (0.261) −0.056 (0.199) −0.048 (0.370)

0.317 (0.574) 0.288 (0.365) 0.402+ (0.234) −0.177 (0.442)

0.350 (0.425) 0.407* (0.200) 0.492*** (0.121) 0.308 (0.238)

Reference −0.120 (0.191) −0.219 (0.311) 0.211 (0.158) 0.214 (0.238) 0.033 (0.087) 0.024+ (0.014)

Reference 0.194+ (0.111) 0.207 (0.165) −0.037 (0.102) 0.298* (0.145) 0.057 (0.049) 0.023* (0.009)

Living with spouse Living in three generation households Other living arrangements

Age 50–59 years Age 60–69 years Age 70 years Male Currently married Number of living children Age of the youngest grandchild

Rural hukou and rural residence Urban hukou and urban residence Rural hukou and urban residence (ruralto-urban migrants) Educationb

Annual family income ≤ 25, 000 yuan > 25,00 & < =50,000 yuan > 50,000 yuan Self-rate health Constant

R-squared Observations

Reference 0.122 (0.082) 0.154 (0.121) −0.025 (0.072) 0.267** (0.103) 0.022 (0.037) 0.021** (0.006)

Reference 0.114 (0.083) 0.149 (0.122) −0.022 (0.072) 0.266* (0.105) 0.022 (0.038) 0.022** (0.006)

−0.107 (0.108) 0.450* (0.204) −0.007 (0.056) 0.014 (0.015)

−0.007 (0.112) 0.574*** (0.160) 0.098+ (0.057) 0.023* (0.009)

0.233 (0.200) −0.509* (0.205) −0.108 (0.108) 0.026* (0.012)

Reference 0.083 (0.162) 0.226 (0.213) −0.165 (0.133) 0.271 (0.201) −0.056 (0.084) 0.022+ (0.012)

Reference 0.486*** (0.089) 0.225* (0.091) 0.003 (0.034)

Reference 0.484*** (0.089) 0.224* (0.091) 0.004 (0.034)

Reference 0.517*** (0.138) 0.290* (0.137) −0.018 (0.049)

Reference 0.386** (0.140) 0.190 (0.138) 0.010 (0.059)

Reference 0.550* (0.221) 0.066 (0.254) 0.135 (0.087)

0.032 (0.054)

−0.160+ (0.085)

0.026 (0.052)

Reference 0.256** (0.097) 0.378*** (0.086) 0.330*** (0.029) 5.804*** (0.195)

Reference 0.254** (0.098) 0.372*** (0.087) 0.329*** (0.029) 5.452*** (0.192)

Reference 0.350* (0.149) 0.439** (0.135) 0.337*** (0.043) 5.344*** (0.319)

Reference 0.276+ (0.151) 0.415** (0.131) 0.328*** (0.045) 5.129*** (0.273)

Reference −0.079 (0.251) 0.089 (0.223) 0.270*** (0.071) 6.522*** (0.414)

Reference 0.135 (0.248) 0.163 (0.227) 0.236*** (0.059) 6.806*** (0.410)

Reference 0.305 (0.236) 0.481* (0.193) 0.297*** (0.065) 6.055*** (0.474)

Reference 0.200 (0.121) 0.364** (0.110) 0.359*** (0.038) 5.115*** (0.251)

0.066 4006

0.067 4006

0.073 1753

0.077 1627

0.083 626

0.036 857

0.052 787

0.065 2362

+ p < 0.1; *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001; robust standard errors in parentheses. a Skipped-generation households = 1, and others = 0. b Education is measured by five levels and treated as a continues variable in the model: 1) “Illiterate/Semi-literate” 2) “Primary school” 3) “Junior high school” 4)”Senior high school” 5) “Some college or above.

benefits in comparison to SGH-living but no difference is detected between solo-living and SGH-living. In the oldest group, happiness does not appear linked to living arrangements. Models 6 through 8 present the results from the subgroup analyses stratified on rural-urban status. The results of rural-urban subgroup analyses demonstrate that living arrangements are not significantly linked to happiness among urban natives or rural-tourban migrants. For rural natives, grandparents living with spouse (coefficient = 0.41; p < 0.05) or living in three-generation households (coefficient = 0.49; p < 0.001) are significantly happier than grandparents living in SGHs. No difference is detected between SGH-living and solo-living among grandparents who are rural natives. Several findings related to the control variables are also noteworthy. Age, gender, and number of living children are not significantly associated with happiness in this sample of grandparents in China. Being married, having older grandchildren, and reporting better health are significant and positive covariates of happiness. In terms of the effects of socioeconomic status, education is not a significant factor, whereas family income is a consistently significant and positive covariate of happiness in the whole sample and nearly all the subsamples with urban natives being the only exception (no income effect on happiness among urban natives). 152

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Among the three rural-urban subgroups, rural natives are generally less happy than urban natives and rural-to-urban migrants and urban natives is the happiest group. 4. Discussion We started this investigation by suggesting that living in SGHs can be either beneficial or detrimental for grandparents, depending on the various ambivalent personal and situational factors that jointly influence living arrangements and emotional wellbeing. While taking care of their grandchildren may be rewarding, the role of surrogate parent and the absence of grandchildren's parents in dayto-day life may incur stressors that counteract the emotional benefits of intergenerational closeness in SGHs. The results of our analyses clearly indicate that living in SGHs is generally not beneficial but detrimental to Chinese grandparents' positive affect or emotional wellbeing measured by happiness, as compared to living with spouse or living in three-generation households. In addition, group-specific analyses indicate that there are variations in the magnitude and significance of the negative impacts of SGH-living for different age and rural-urban groups. The majority of SGHs form due to the middle generation's movement to cities away from their place of household registration, or hukou. Grandparents have been called the “silent engine” behind China's economic growth (Singapore Management University, 2016) because of their tremendous contribution to grandchild care, which in turn allows their adult children and/or children-in-law to focus on conducting economically productive activities that benefit the extended family while making contributions to China's economy on the whole. There are many reasons why grandparents would take on full-time grandchild care, ranging from making altruistic choices to being forced into this role due to complex intrinsic (e.g., altruism and lifestyle preferences) and/or situational (e.g. retirement options and strategic investment as a form of exchange) factors. Some grandparents feel the urge to contribute to their adult children's lives after they retire, proudly taking on surrogate parenting roles while enjoying a strong sense of accomplishment, pride, and usefulness (Goh, 2009). Others may purposefully agree to providing care and living in SGHs consisting of only grandparents and grandchildren as a form of reciprocity, such that provision of resources to adult children in this way may be exchanged for old-age support (Silverstein et al., 2007). This expectation for reciprocity is grounded in the strong familistic values imbued in Chinese society and supported by the common practices that adult children increase financial and emotional help when they receive help from with child care from parents (Cong and Silverstein, 2012). There are also grandparents who have many enrichment plans for their retirement but cannot fulfil them because they feel obligated to provide grandchild care to help their adult children to get by in daily living. This group of grandparents may be emotionally compromised by feeling trapped in an undesirable but imperative family situation (Goh, 2009). Therefore, a priori predictions for the implications of living in SGHs for grandparents’ emotional wellbeing is mixed, as competing hypotheses are formed based on different role theories and the choice theory. However, the consistent and negative effects of living in SGHs on happiness observed in this study clearly indicate that emotional deficits can result when grandparents take on resident surrogate parenting duties, an effect that does not vary by gender, education or family income. These robust results indicate that psychological costs generally outweigh benefits associated with living in SGHs. This key finding is consistent with the pattern reported by Ren and Treiman (2015) based on analyses of the first wave of CFPS collected in 2010. Replication of the previous results suggests that the negative impacts of living in SGHs remain strong and robust when using more recently collected CFPS data and when using the living arrangement predictor measured in 2012 to predict happiness measured in 2014. This result is inconsistent with what Chen and Liu (2012) reported in their longitudinal study in a timeframe from 1991 to 2006 on the non-significant effect of living in SGHs on self-rated health. One explanation for this discrepancy is that the detrimental impacts of living in SGHs are stronger for emotional health than for self-rated health, the outcome examined in Chen and Liu's study. Self-rated health is a more general indicator of overall wellbeing, including aspects of physical health that may be less affected by living arrangements than emotional wellbeing. The finding that SGH-living is emotionally detrimental lends support for the role strain theory and the notion that performing the role of surrogate parent is generally stressful for grandparents in China. This finding does not support the role enhancement theory and suggests contingencies on the rosy image of a good elderly life involving “mouthing malt sugars and dallying with one's grandson” (“含饴弄孙”) and “carrying on the family line” (“传宗接代”) as the old Chinese sayings go. Having grandchildren in the household every day is neither necessary nor sufficient for grandparents' experiencing positive affect. According to our findings, the two forms of living arrangement that are most beneficial to grandparents' emotional wellbeing are living with one's spouse without any children living at home and living with both adult children and grandchildren in the household. The emotional benefit of independent living of older Chinese is also reported in a study reported by Wang et al. (2014) showing that for married couples age 80 or above in China, co-residence with children does not bring additional benefits to the emotional wellbeing. Evidence like this points to a trend among Chinese older adults towards increasingly valuing independence and nuclear living arrangements. We found two moderating factors that either mitigated or exacerbated the negative link between SGH-living and happiness for Chinese grandparents. SGH-living is particularly detrimental for emotional wellbeing among the younger elderly group (aged between 60 and 69), which contradicts our expectation that SGH-living would be most detrimental to the oldest group because they are less energetic than their younger counterparts. The younger elders are typically not as energetic as the middle-aged and may feel more physically challenged by adopting a surrogate parenting role. Meanwhile, they are also physically healthier and stronger than the oldest group and may possess more desires and plans for an enriched retirement life. They are thus more likely to be dissatisfied if they feel they are forfeiting their fun retirement plans because they need to spend time taking care of their grandchildren and doing household chores. The non-significant effect of SGH-living for the oldest group is intriguing. About 19% of those living in SGHs in 2012 are 70 years old or older, which is the smallest age group among the SGH-living grandparents. Perhaps only the healthiest and 153

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most motivated grandparents are willing to take on the surrogate parenting role at advanced ages. This selection bias needs to be empirically tested in future work. Rural-urban origin and residence also moderates how SGH-living plays a role in grandparents' emotional wellbeing. SGH-living seems emotionally detrimental only for grandparents who are rural natives, while neither urban natives nor rural-to-urban migrants see any significant effect of SGH-living on emotional wellbeing. These results provide mixed evidence on the choice theory, which predicts that SGH-living is more emotionally detrimental for urban native grandparents than for rural native grandparents with the rural-to-urban migrant grandparents being the least affected by SGH-living. The shaping of one's perception on a desired retirement life is a dynamic and complex process. Perhaps retirement choices and intergenerational responsibilities are not necessarily incompatible after all, considering that urban native grandparents have the greatest amount of resources and retirement choices relative to other grandparents in China yet also appear to be less emotionally vulnerable to SGH-living than rural native grandparents. An emerging U.S.-based literature on the wellbeing of caregivers of people with dementia shows that the caregiver's motivations for providing care and the meaning she or he finds in caregiving have positive implications for the wellbeing of the caregivers who are typically unpaid family members (Quinn et al., 2010). Motivations and meanings are likely also important in explaining emotional disparities among grandparents living in SGHs. Qualitative studies are needed to evaluate these premises. Some results on the control variables are also noteworthy. In this sample, family income is a considerably more relevant socioeconomic indicator than education for Chinese grandparents' positive affect experience. Family income is directly linked to economic security and purchasing power in China, as the social protection system is inadequate and the credit market is less developed in China than in many western countries. The most consistent effect among the control variables across our models is the positive link between self-rated health and happiness. As a proxy for perceived general health status, self-rated health is a measure that has been widely validated across cultures and population groups including in Chinese settings (Qi, 2014). Controlling for selfrated health can help reduce the potential reverse causation bias as some forms of living arrangements in old age are triggered by older parents’ health statuses (Zimmer et al., 2010). This study is limited in two important ways. First, this is an observational study with a short follow-up time, producing evidence suggestive of associations rather than causality. In other words, the findings reported in this study do not speak to causal inferences. We controlled for self-rated health in the analysis to reduce the possible biases caused by health-triggered reverse causation, but residual sources of endogeneity are inevitable. Second, the mechanisms that explain the associations between SGH-living and happiness are not examined. The nature of intergenerational transfer is a good candidate but not measured for middle-aged participants in the CFPS. This study makes unique contributions to the aging and health literature in China. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that uses recent, longitudinal data from a nationally representative survey to examine the emotional health impacts of living in SGHs among middle-aged and elderly grandparents in China. Although the literature on living arrangements and emotional health in China is flourishing, most studies have not focused on SGH-living and have excluded middle-aged grandparents (Chen et al., 2011; Goh, 2009; Ren and Treiman, 2015; Wang et al., 2014; Ye and Chen, 2014). This study also presents novel evidence on how ruralurban hukou and residence plays a role in grandparents’ positive affect and in moderating the effects of living arrangements on positive affect, suggesting SGH-living is particularly detrimental to rural native grandparents, contrary to expectations according to the choice theory. Our key finding that grandparents living in SGHs are psychologically impaired begs for further elaboration of mechanisms and contextualization. More mixed-methods studies are needed to better understand the causes, experiences, and consequences of living in SGHs for various socio-demographic groups of grandparents. 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