中国农村家庭教育资源分配的“末孩优势”及其影响因素

“The Advantages of the Youngest Children” and Its Influenced Factors on the Education Resource Allocation in Rural Chinese Families

在多子女家庭中有限的家庭教育资源普遍存在着向特定排行位置集中的现象,表现出明显的"排行效应"。但是,家庭教育资源究竟向何种特定的排行位置集中却表现出东西差异:在西方发达国家,最年长的子女在个人教育获得上表现出明显的优势;而在中国及东南亚地区,最年幼的子女反而获得了更多的家庭教育资源。本文利用中国综合社会调查的相关数据并立足于家庭内部的资源分配结构,对中国农村多子女家庭中教育资源分配的"末孩优势"及其形成机制进行系统考察。在中国人的日常观念中,"末孩优势"通常被理解为父母在感情上对最小子女的特别偏爱。然而,本文研究发现这种"偏爱"实际上是资源分配结构的产物。从资源条件来看,"末孩优势"的形成主要受父辈文化资本的局限而不是经济资本的约束。从分配逻辑来看,"末孩优势"则是"代际倾斜"和"代内供给"共同作用的结果。中国农村多子女家庭中教育资源分配的"末孩优势"是文化资本层面的约束机制、由"代际倾斜"和"代内供给"构成的资源调剂机制的产物。但是上述两类社会机制有可能受制于特定的社会情境和政策环境而无法产生作用,导致某些影响"末孩优势"的具体关系消失于特定的世代群体。

In multi-children＇s families,it is an universal phenomenon that the limited education resources are pooled to the one in a specific birth-order position in a family,showing a significant＂birth-order effect＂. However,there is an interesting difference between China and western countries on which birth-order position the family education resources likely pooled to：in the western developed countries the oldest children have an obvious advantage in education resources attainment,whereas in China and Southeast Asia the youngest children can get more family education resources. According to the data of Chinese General Social Survey,this paper is based on the resource allocation structure within the family and investigate systematically the advantages of the youngest children in the education resources allocation and its forming mechanism in the rural multi-children＇s families. In Chinese ordinary conception,the advantages of the youngest children are widely regarded as parents＇ special emotional preference for the youngest child in a family. However,this study finds that this preference is the product of the structure on resource allocation.From the view of resource conditions,the formation of the advantages of the youngest children is mainly subject to the limitations of parents＇ culture capital rather than the constraints of their economic capital. From the logic of resource allocations,the advantages of the youngest children are the result of the intergenerational and generational supports. In summary,in Chinese rural multi-children families the advantages of the youngest children in education resources allocation are the product of the mechanism of culture capital constraint,and the resource adjustment mechanism composed of the inter-and intra-generational resource supports. However,due to the specific social contexts and policy environment,these two types of social mechanisms may not create effects,which make some specific relationship impacting the advantages of the youngest children disappeared from such cohorts.