Female domestic workers often take on multiple roles in different settings, such as that of mothers and migrants. This study focuses on women’s diverse trajectories in timing motherhood and migration from a temporal perspective. Despite the continuities between their paid work for their employers and unpaid care for their own families, both of which are highly feminized, migrant women often face tensions and conflicts between the two; it is difficult to be a good worker and a good mother at the same time. Drawing on the Survey of Foreign Domestic Workers in Hong Kong, this study provides a quantitative picture of how some women decide to move before becoming mothers and some afterward, as well as their different long-term mobility tendencies. The findings lend support to a selectivity process that highly educated women are more likely to be non-mother migrants; they are more likely to move at a younger age and when they are unmarried. However, over time, migrants who were mothers at the time of their first migration are more likely to conduct multiple moves. Such mixed findings suggest that women’s migration is interrelated with motherhood in complex ways, which may reflect the need of repeated migration by mothers on the one hand, and the gender beliefs that continue to regard migrant women as neglecting their families and deviating from feminine domesticity on the other.

The decline in total fertility rates in Western countries, particularly the Nordic countries, has puzzled demographers. Researchers assume that the decline is associated with increasing perceptions of uncertainties about the future. In this study, we explore whether childbearing intentions have also declined and whether individuals have become more uncertain about future childbearing. To do so, we compare childbearing intentions expressed by participants in the 2012 and 2021 Swedish Generations and Gender Surveys. We present multinominal logistic regressions of respondents’ answers to the question whether they definitely or probably intend to have a(nother) child in the next three years and (if not) whether they (ever) intend to have a(nother) child in the future. Our findings indicate that the intentions to definitely have a(nother) child have declined across socio-demographic groups, and that uncertainties about future childbearing have increased. These changes were particularly pronounced among young people and among childless respondents, indicating a growing indecision as well as a growing tendency to remain childfree among groups that are relevant for future fertility development. The decline in intentions and the increase in uncertainties about childbearing indicate that the ongoing fertility decline cannot be classified as a temporary phenomenon. Rather, the results suggest that the decline will continue, because childbearing intentions are rarely fully realized. Our results are a step toward unraveling the puzzle of declining fertility in the Nordic region and beyond. The findings reveal that individuals have become more uncertain about future childbearing and that they have become more likely to retreat from childbearing.

China has witnessed an increasing trend in couple migration within the country. Research has argued that China's massive migration can be a driving force for transforming couples’ unequal gender relations in Chinese families. This study examines the impacts of couple migration within and across provinces on couples’ highly gendered housework dynamics. The study draws on five waves of panel data from the China Family Panel Studies (2010, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2020) and employs couple fixed effects models. This study provides a first nationally representative descriptive account of Chinese migrant couples’ housework arrangements. More importantly, model results show that couples’ cross-province migration leads to decreases in husbands’ and wives’ housework time and couples’ total housework time. However, couple migration, no matter moving within or across provinces, does not affect how the husbands and wives divide housework. This study argues that despite some impacts on housework arising from couples’ migration to other provinces, couple migration does not weaken or reinforce gender inequality in the within-couple division of housework. Other aspects of gender relations than the gender division of housework may be more prone to change as a consequence of couple migration in the Chinese context.

The thesis examines the interdependent relationships between gender roles in the family and internal migration in China. Study I explains gender differences in labor migration outcomes from the perspective of the migration intention-behavior link. Study II investigates how men’s and women’s marriage and family status are related to their first labor migration and whether these associations change across birth cohorts. Study III examines how having a migrant spouse affects the non-migrant husband’s and wife’s housework time and whether this impact is moderated by intergenerational co-residence. Study IV explores the relationship between married couples’ joint migration and housework dynamics, especially the intra-couple gender division of housework. 

Overall, this thesis has contributed to a better understanding of why Chinese men have higher migration risks than Chinese women. It demonstrates that Chinese individuals’ gender roles in the family are an important underpinning of the gender differentials in migration propensities. This thesis has also highlighted the inertia of the traditional gender role division in migrants’ families, casting doubt on the often-argued narrative about the potential of migration to unsettle the unequal gender relations in family life in China.

Prior studies have consistently documented Chinese women’s lower migration rates. This study draws on the perspective of linking migration intentions and behavior to explain whether the gender differences in Chinese people’s labor migration behavior arise from men’s and women’s differences in migration intentions or in turning migration intentions into behavior. Using two waves of data from the Longitudinal Survey on Rural Urban Migration in China carried out in 2008 and 2009, this study links one-year labor migration intentions and outcomes for men and women in rural China. Results indicate that compared with men, women have lower levels of one-year labor migration intentions and outcomes and are also less likely to turn positive labor migration intentions into behavior. The study finds that gender differences in labor migration outcomes are partly related to the fact that men are more responsive to their positive labor migration intentions, but also to fact that men are more likely than women to migrate against their negative migration intentions. Reflections on using migration intentions to study migration behavior in this Chinese context and beyond are provided.

This study uses the 2006 and 2016 East Asian Social Surveys to map value changes related to the second demographic transition in mainland China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. The study examines trends in attitudes towards cohabitation, childrearing, and divorce over a 10-year period in the four East Asian societies. The findings suggest that the second demographic transition, if any in East Asia, is an uneven process between societies, and mainland China stands out as the only society in which attitudes had become more conservative, even after controlling for compositional differences in population. In the other three societies, attitudes had shifted to be more liberal. Moreover, the study finds little evidence on the diffusion within societies, given their similar trends across different sociodemographic groups. From an ideational perspective, mainland China and the other three East Asian societies illustrated different patterns of attitude changes regarding marriage and family. From a behavioral perspective, trends in attitudes do not always align with demographic patterns at the macro level, especially in mainland China. More studies are needed to understand the nuanced differences in ideational shifts between societies and the relationship between ideational and behavioral changes in East Asia.

China has witnessed rising cohabitation and robust marriage at the same time. This study uses a mixed-methods approach to examine perceptions of cohabitation and the linkage between cohabitation and marriage. Quantitative results suggest generally tolerant perceptions of cohabitation and more divided views about the delinking of cohabitation and marriage. Qualitative analyses illustrate that women embrace flexible intimacy to make the best marriage choice, while men try to link cohabitation and marriage to prove their economic capability and sexual responsibility.Under China's materialistic turn that enhances market risks and the state-supported intimate turn that privatizes family matters, this study illustrates the persisting gender inequalities in the institution of marriage and the unique forms of Chinese modernity with a combination of traditional expectations and individualistic desires.