Whether these women developed progressive ideas about women having careers, or more conformist views on a woman’s place being ‘in the home’, can be traced back to various features of their lives – specifically their social standing and financial situation compared to that of their husbands and in-laws.
Dr Ye Liu, Reader, Department of International Development
19 February 2025
Award nomination for gender attitudes research in China
Research by a King’s expert on gender relations in contemporary China has been nominated for a prestigious academic award.
Dr Ye Liu is a finalist in The 2025 SAGE Prize for Innovation and Excellence, which is awarded annually to one paper in each of the British Sociology Association's journals.
A Reader in the Department of International Development, her research focuses on gender inequality in the workplace, family life, and intergenerational relationships in China.
The work nominated for the award for papers published in the journal Sociology considered how patriarchal ideas affect attitudes to gender roles amongst women born to the ‘one-child’ generation.
China’s one child policy ran from 1979 to 2015, and was designed to control the size of the country’s population for - primarily - economic reasons. The cap was subsequently raised to two, and now three, children per family.
Dr Liu said this generation of women were a fascinating group for a number of reasons.
“Without siblings, these women are in line to inherit all their parents wealth, and living through the eighties and nineties, have witnessed an unprecedented opening up of Chinese society. As a result many are highly educated.
“In other words, those women with higher social standing and financial independence were more likely to be progressive and push back against patriarchal norms.”
The SAGE Prize for Innovation and Excellence is awarded annually to one paper in each of the BSA's prestigious journals: Cultural Sociology, Sociological Research Online, Sociology and Work, Employment and Society.
The prize is awarded to the paper published in the previous year's volume judged to represent innovation or excellence in the field.
The prize is £250 worth of SAGE books or a free annual individual subscription to a journal of the winner's choice.
The winner will be announced late April during the 2025 BSA Annual Conference (23-25 April 2025).
Read the paper
Ye Liu (2024). Virtues or Talent among Brotherless Daughters: A Study of How Patriarchal Gender Ideals Affect Gender Role Attitudes among Women from the One-Child Generation in China. Sociology, 58(1), 175-193.
In this story
Reader in International Development