复旦大学：《视觉文化与社会性别》参考文献_Love Matches and Arranged Marriages.pdf

XU XIAOHE AND MARTIN KING WHYTE University of michigan Love Matches and Arranged Marriages A Chinese Replication Data from a probability sample of 586 ever. Through some combination of structural mod married women in Chengdu, Sichuan, in the Peo- ernization, cultural Westernization, and govern ple's Republic of China, are used to examine the mental pressure, arranged marriages are increas transition from arranged to free-choice marriages ingly giving way to freedom of choice, or"love in that society. Retrospective data on mate-choice matche pple play the domi experiences reveal that the role of parents has nant role in selecting whom they will marry.(For declined sharply while young people more and the classic account of this transition worldwide ore dominate the process of spouse selection However, the transition toward free mate choice Even though the nature of the trend is in- Dears to have made little further headway in re- disputable, its implications are not. Individuals cent years, and there is still little sign of a"dating reared in the West, where youth-driven"mate culture"emerging Variations in mate-choice ex- choice has been the rule in most social strata for periences are used to test the prediction of de- centuries, assume that this shift from arranged fenders of arranged marriage that"love matches marriages to love matches is progressive and start out hot and grow cold, while arranged mar- "healthy. As young people are increasingly riages start out cold and grow hot. In a partial freed from arbitrary family dictates and controls replication of an investigation of the same ques- they are able to select partners tion conducted by robert blood in Tokyo, Japan, criteria of love and personal compatibility, and in 1959, the evidence refutes this prediction. the result should be happier marriages and in- Multiple regression analyses indicate that wives in dividuals. In the " bad old days 'of arranged mar- Chengdu love matches are more satisfied with riages, according to this view, many people found their marital relationships than their counterparts themselves stuck in marriages with persons in arranged marriages, regardless of the length decidedly not of their own choosing, mates factors that differentiate these two types of repulsive. The shift away from arranger onl the marriage, and that this difference cannot be selected on the basis of family status, wealth attributed to the influence of other background other criteria, whom they might find perso riage, then, should reduce the level of marital misery in a society Throughout the world a revolution has been tak Traditionalists in many parts of the world raise ing place in the way mates are selected. In societies questions about this set of assumptions, however where parents used to select marital partners for They point to the high divorce rates in modern their children, the power of parents is crumbling. societies characterized by freedom of mate choice evidence of the pro Journal of Marriage and the Family 52(August 1990): 709-722

Xu XIAOHE AND MARTIN KING WHYTE University of Michigan Love Matches and Arranged Marriages: A Chinese Replication Data from a probability sample of 586 evermarried women in Chengdu, Sichuan, in the People's Republic of China, are used to examine the transition from arranged to free-choice marriages in that society. Retrospective data on mate-choice experiences reveal that the role of parents has declined sharply, while young people more and more dominate the process of spouse selection. However, the transition toward free mate choice appears to have made little further headway in recent years, and there is still little sign of a "dating culture" emerging. Variations in mate-choice experiences are used to test the prediction of defenders of arranged marriage that "love matches start out hot and grow cold, while arranged marriages start out cold and grow hot." In a partial replication of an investigation of the same question conducted by Robert Blood in Tokyo, Japan, in 1959, the evidence refutes this prediction. Multiple regression analyses indicate that wives in Chengdu love matches are more satisfied with their marital relationships than their counterparts in arranged marriages, regardless of the length of the marriage, and that this difference cannot be attributed to the influence of other background factors that differentiate these two types of women. Throughout the world a revolution has been taking place in the way mates are selected. In societies where parents used to select marital partners for their children, the power of parents is crumbling. Department of Sociology, University of Michigan, 3012 Literature, Science, and the Arts Building, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1382. Through some combination of structural modernization, cultural Westernization, and governmental pressure, arranged marriages are increasingly giving way to freedom of choice, or "love matches," in which young people play the dominant role in selecting whom they will marry. (For the classic account of this transition worldwide, see Goode, 1963.) Even though the nature of the trend is indisputable, its implications are not. Individuals reared in the West, where "youth-driven" mate choice has been the rule in most social strata for centuries, assume that this shift from arranged marriages to love matches is progressive and "healthy." As young people are increasingly freed from arbitrary family dictates and controls, they are able to select partners according to criteria of love and personal compatibility, and the result should be happier marriages and individuals. In the "bad old days" of arranged marriages, according to this view, many people found themselves stuck in marriages with persons decidedly not of their own choosing, mates selected on the basis of family status, wealth, or other criteria, whom they might find personally repulsive.' The shift away from arranged marriage, then, should reduce the level of marital misery in a society. Traditionalists in many parts of the world raise questions about this set of assumptions, however. They point to the high divorce rates in modern societies characterized by freedom of mate choice as evidence of the problems inherent in love matches. They claim that arranged marriages have virtues that are not appreciated by people in Western societies. The contrast they draw is ilJournal of Marriage and the Family 52 (August 1990): 709-722 709

710 lustrated by the phrase, love matches start out up. After the marriage the couple will have the hot and grow cold, while arranged marriages start opportunity to get to know one another and forge out cold and grow hot. 'In other words, love common bonds. As this process occurs, com matches typically involve a very intense romantic patibility and mutual concern are likely to lead to involvement, accompanied by idealization of the a mature form of love, perhaps never as"hot ' as partner and fantasies about wedded bliss, in thethe premarital emotions experienced in a love period prior to the wedding(the"hot phase). match, but a relationship that provides a more Then after the wedding, reality sets in, and some realistic and durable bond that can survive the test combination of domestic chores, child care of time and family difficulties. In the long run, at burdens, financial anxieties, and mundane life least, the traditionalists claim, arranged marriages with a less-than-ideal real life partner leads to a give more satisfaction than free-choice marriages more or less inevitable decline in romantic feelings In Figure I we present a hypothetical picture of and satisfaction with the relationship over the the trends in marriage satisfaction that might be years. Here traditionalists can point to a con- found for love matches and arranged marriages if siderable accumulation of evidence, from both the claims of traditionalists are correct cross-sectional and longitudinal studies in But can we assume that spouses selected by Western societies, showing that marital happiness parents will have any realistic basis for developing and satisfaction ratings do tend to decline over the a compatible relationship? Critics of arranged course of a marriage(see for example, Pineo, marriages can point to cases that make this seem 1961; Renne, 1970; Hicks and Platt, 1970) quite unlikely-of a young and vital woman mar- The trajectory for arranged marriages, accord- ried off to an old and feeble man, or to a de know each other well, or perhaps not at all, and However, traditionalists argue that such cases are since they don' t have any romantic feelings for atypical and that arranged marriages are gener one another prior to the marriage, the partners in more likely to produce compatibility than are love an arranged marriage "have nowhere to go but matches. They argue that parents are concerned FIGURE 1. HYPOTHETICAL TRENDS FOR MARRIAGE SATI ION IN OVE MATCHES AND ARRANGED MARRIAGES -cH Love Matches 5-8 9.14 15-19 20-25

Journal of Marriage and the Family lustrated by the phrase, "love matches start out hot and grow cold, while arranged marriages start out cold and grow hot." In other words, love matches typically involve a very intense romantic involvement, accompanied by idealization of the partner and fantasies about wedded bliss, in the period prior to the wedding (the "hot" phase). Then after the wedding, reality sets in, and some combination of domestic chores, child care burdens, financial anxieties, and mundane life with a less-than-ideal real life partner leads to a more or less inevitable decline in romantic feelings and satisfaction with the relationship over the years. Here traditionalists can point to a considerable accumulation of evidence, from both cross-sectional and longitudinal studies in Western societies, showing that marital happiness and satisfaction ratings do tend to decline over the course of a marriage (see for example, Pineo, 1961; Renne, 1970; Hicks and Platt, 1970).2 The trajectory for arranged marriages, according to traditionalists, is different. Since they don't know each other well, or perhaps not at all, and since they don't have any romantic feelings for one another prior to the marriage, the partners in an arranged marriage "have nowhere to go but up." After the marriage the couple will have the opportunity to get to know one another and forge common bonds. As this process occurs, compatibility and mutual concern are likely to lead to a mature form of love, perhaps never as "hot" as the premarital emotions experienced in a love match, but a relationship that provides a more realistic and durable bond that can survive the test of time and family difficulties. In the long run, at least, the traditionalists claim, arranged marriages give more satisfaction than free-choice marriages. In Figure 1 we present a hypothetical picture of the trends in marriage satisfaction that might be found for love matches and arranged marriages if the claims of traditionalists are correct. But can we assume that spouses selected by parents will have any realistic basis for developing a compatible relationship? Critics of arranged marriages can point to cases that make this seem quite unlikely-of a young and vital woman married off to an old and feeble man, or to a deformed son of a wealthy family, and so forth. However, traditionalists argue that such cases are atypical and that arranged marriages are generally more likely to produce compatibility than are love matches. They argue that parents are concerned FIGURE 1. HYPOTHETICAL TRENDS FOR MARRIAGE SATISFACTION IN LOVE MATCHES AND ARRANGED MARRIAGES 6 ---- Love Matches 0--- Arranged Marriages -2 . . . . . . ..... 0-1 2-4 5-8 9-14 15-19 20-25 25+ Years Married 0 0 -_ (n o, 0) 4 - 2- 0 - - r- 710

Love Matches and Arranged marriages in China 711 about the happiness of their offspring and will the trend was the opposite, with women from ar usually be in a better position to judge com- ranged marriages eventually being much more patibility in the long run than their children are dissatisfied and having fewer love feelings than They can rationally evaluate the nature of their their counterparts from love matches. If there are own child and investigate the character of a pro- any advantages to arranged marriages, according ective spou nd then use their to the Tokyo evidence, they accrue only to wisdo husbands. In any case the of marital from that posited by the may be young and immature, and even if not they traditionalists, without the signs of steady im may be too swayed by emotions and hormones to provement(becoming "hot")suggested in the choice of tner. The hypothetica result of allowing young people to choose their in Figure I own spouses, then, may be that they will be Several features of the Tokyo study make a blinded by love and overlook areas of personal in- replication elsewhere seem worthwhile. Fir compatibility, and the latter will become apparent restricted nature of the sample used by and cause problems later on in the marriage raises questions about whether the same sort of Parents are less likely to be so blinded or so the pattern would have been found even in Japan argument goes with a more representative sample. Second, Blood did not subject his results to multivariate analysis LOVE MATCHES AND ARRANGED MARRIAGES thus leaving open the question of whether the con IN TOKYO trasts drawn between the two types of marriage could be spurious. Finally, it is not clear that this So far as we are aware, this set of arguments, and single Japanese case study can allow us to be con particularly those involving arranged marriages, clusive about the merits or demerits of the two has been systematically investigated only once. In types of marriage. For the majority of the 1959 Robert Blood conducted a survey in Tokyo, Japanese population, the peasants, free choice Japan, that was designed specifically to compare and even trial marriages had been the rule up to a love matches and arranged marriages(see Blood, century prior to Bloods survey, with arranged 1967). Blood and his associates interviewed 444 marriage being fostered subsequently through a married couples who lived in nuclear-family process ofsamuraization"(see the discussion in households in three predominantly white-collar Goode, 1963, chap 7). Then American military housing projects in Tokyo, with a further restric- occupation after World War II played some role tion that the wives in these families had to be age in undermining this newly dominant arranged 40 or younger. His research resulted in a serious marriage custom. Given this history, we might challenge to the"starting hot and cooling down suspect that cultural support for love-match and versus starting cold and heating up,argument arranged-marriage alternatives in Japan would be presented by defenders of arranged marriage, pa different and perhaps more shallow than in other cular ly in the case of wives. societies. In any case, not only social scientists Figures 2 and 3 convey important results from but also individuals in transitional societies who the blood study that are central to that challenge are debating these alternatives and facing anx Using a variety of indicators of marriage quality, ieties about finding a spouse, deserve additional such as those shown in these figures, Blood ttempts to compare the implications for marital not find the pattern of starting cold and heating relations in free-choice and arranged marriages up posited for arranged marriages. Rather, for both types of marriages the long-term trajectory downward, toward less expres A PARTIAL REPLICATION IN THE lower marriage satisfaction. For arranged- PEOPLES REPUBLIC OF CH marriage (miai husbands this decline was more In the pages that follow we report the results of a gradual than for their love-match counterparts, so partial replication of the love-match/arranged that in later stages the men who had experienced marriage comparison conducted in Chengdu, the arranged marriages were more satisfied and ex- capital of Sichuan Province, in the People's perienced more love feelings. However, for wives Republic of China. a probability sample of

Love Matches and Arranged Marriages in China about the happiness of their offspring and will usually be in a better position to judge compatibility in the long run than their children are. They can rationally evaluate the nature of their own child and investigate the character of a prospective spouse for that child and then use their wisdom and experience to arrive at the most "suitable" match. Their offspring, in contrast, may be young and immature, and even if not they may be too swayed by emotions and hormones to make a "wise" choice of a marital partner.3 The result of allowing young people to choose their own spouses, then, may be that they will be blinded by love and overlook areas of personal incompatibility, and the latter will become apparent and cause problems later on in the marriage. Parents are less likely to be so blinded, or so the argument goes. LOVE MATCHES AND ARRANGED MARRIAGES IN TOKYO So far as we are aware, this set of arguments, and particularly those involving arranged marriages, has been systematically investigated only once. In 1959 Robert Blood conducted a survey in Tokyo, Japan, that was designed specifically to compare love matches and arranged marriages (see Blood, 1967). Blood and his associates interviewed 444 married couples who lived in nuclear-family households in three predominantly white-collar housing projects in Tokyo, with a further restriction that the wives in these families had to be age 40 or younger. His research resulted in a serious challenge to the "starting hot and cooling down versus starting cold and heating up" argument presented by defenders of arranged marriage, particularly in the case of wives. Figures 2 and 3 convey important results from the Blood study that are central to that challenge. Using a variety of indicators of marriage quality, such as those shown in these figures, Blood did not find the pattern of starting cold and heating up posited for arranged marriages. Rather, for both types of marriages the long-term trajectory was downward, toward less expression of love and lower marriage satisfaction. For arrangedmarriage (miai) husbands this decline was more gradual than for their love-match counterparts, so that in later stages the men who had experienced arranged marriages were more satisfied and experienced more love feelings. However, for wives the trend was the opposite, with women from arranged marriages eventually being much more dissatisfied and having fewer love feelings than their counterparts from love matches. If there are any advantages to arranged marriages, according to the Tokyo evidence, they accrue only to husbands. In any case the trajectory of marital feelings is quite different from that posited by the traditionalists, without the signs of steady improvement (becoming "hot") suggested in the hypothetical curve for arranged marriages shown in Figure 1.4 Several features of the Tokyo study make a replication elsewhere seem worthwhile. First, the restricted nature of the sample used by Blood raises questions about whether the same sort of pattern would have been found even in Japan with a more representative sample. Second, Blood did not subject his results to multivariate analysis, thus leaving open the question of whether the contrasts drawn between the two types of marriage could be spurious. Finally, it is not clear that this single Japanese case study can allow us to be conclusive about the merits or demerits of the two types of marriage. For the majority of the Japanese population, the peasants, free choice and even trial marriages had been the rule up to a century prior to Blood's survey, with arranged marriage being fostered subsequently through a process of "samuraization" (see the discussion in Goode, 1963, chap. 7). Then American military occupation after World War II played some role in undermining this newly dominant arrangedmarriage custom. Given this history, we might suspect that cultural support for love-match and arranged-marriage alternatives in Japan would be different and perhaps more shallow than in other societies. In any case, not only social scientists, but also individuals in transitional societies who are debating these alternatives and facing anxieties about finding a spouse, deserve additional attempts to compare the implications for marital relations in free-choice and arranged marriages. A PARTIAL REPLICATION IN THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA In the pages that follow we report the results of a partial replication of the love-match/arrangedmarriage comparison conducted in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province, in the People's Republic of China. A probability sample of 586 711