ABSTRACT

Since the 1980s，China has experienced a sustained high sex ratio at birth which leads to severe male “marriage squeeze” phenomenon at the first marriage market. Marriage squeeze will not only increase rural men’s difficulties in getting married，but also affect the marital quality and family stability，which is a major problem for sustainable development. Based on the classical theoretical integration，this book puts forward a macro-and microlevel framework to analyze the marriage squeeze and marital violence in rural china under the background of rural-urban migration. Using data from “2010 nationwide survey in hundreds of villages” and “rural-urban migrants in X City of Fujian province”，this book analyse impacts of son preference and stress of marrige squeeze on the marital violence in rural china under the background of rural-urban migration. Hierarchical linear Model，Logistic regression is employed and the main contributions of this dissertation are the following.

1.Put forwarda macrolevel and microlevel framework to analyze the marriage squeeze and marital violence in rural china under the background of rural-urban migration and gendenr imbalance in China. This book summary conceptual framework of marital violence based on the classical theoretical integration reference to psychology，relative resource，emotion relationships，stress and social culture theory，then we developed framework by bringing migration perspective and introducing macrolevel factors including son preference culture，marriage squeeze，microlevel factors including migration and men’s difficulties in getting married. The developed framework makes up the lack of examination of marriage squeeze and marital violence in rural china under the background of rural-urban migration，and provides a new way of thinking locally about the marital violence in contempory china.

2.It is found that marriage squeeze has multiple influences on the occurrence of rural domestic and marital violence，and the flow increases the influence of marriage squeeze on rural domestic and marital violence. The results showed that the macro level of son preference culture and marriage squeeze structural factors of life in rural society，rural marital violence were not significantly affect marriage，but marriage squeeze structural factors cohorts in the sex ratio of flow in rural family husband and wife mutual violence has significant inhibitory effect；The experience of husbands’ difficulty in getting married at the micro level will significantly increase the occurrence of mutual violence in rural families，and the experience of husbands’ difficulty in getting married will also significantly increase the occurrence of unilateral violence by husbands in mobile rural families.

3.Marriage Squeeze has multiple effects of stimulation and inhibition onrural men’s marital violence，migration weakened the effects of socio-cultural norms and marriage squeeze on husband-to-wife violence. We find that son preference culture has postive effect on non-migrating rural husband perpetrate physical violence，while marriage squeeze have negative effect on non-migrating rural husband perpetrate physical violence，son preference culture and marriage squeeze have no significant effect on migrating rural husband perpetrate marital violence. Microlevel factors including patriarchal idea and men’s difficulties in getting married have postive effect on husband-to-wife violence.

4.Marriage Squeeze has significant effect on wife-to-husband violence perpetrated by non-migrating rural wife，the increase of spatial distance and the impact of modern urban civilization brought by migrant workers eliminate the impact of marriage squeeze on their martial violence. We find that son preference culture has no significant effect on wife-to-husband violence，while marriage squeeze has negative effect on non-migrating rural wife perpetrate physical violence，microlevel factors including patriarchal idea and men’s difficulties in getting married have postive effect on wife-to-husband violence.