A Study On The Family-Provide For The Aged In Yan Village

The data used in this paper come from a research depending on methods such as questionnaire , interview participant observation and so on, which have been carried out in Yan village of Hebei Providence.Based on the research, the author think that there are five phases in the process of family-provide to the aged in Yan village. The five phases are break up the family and live apart, half-independence, family provide for the aged in narrow sense, severe disease and funeral. In the aged' eye, the last two phases of severe disease and funeral are important in the their old-life, and at the same time, the two phases make up of the main content of the family-provide for the aged.This paper have four parts. Part one is an introduction about the background of the aged problem and some basic conceptions used in this study.Part two is a review on the affect factors to the providing for the aged based on literature or material in this study field.Part three is the description of the family-provide for the aged in Yan Village. The author points out that the essence of the family-provide for the aged is the son-provide for the aged. And the daughter' function is only gel (present) that different essentially from the son' yang (burden).Part four is an analysis and interpretation based on the material result in the description. Using the Coleman' rational choice perspective, the author put forward six old -supporting system which including the son system, the daughter system, the son-in-law system, non-children system, stranger or neighbor system and collective or social system. In the rational choice perspective, the aged choose the son system is a rational choice. To the aged, they would like toattach more trust to their son so that they think their gain is more than loss. But in the rational perspective, the higher probability of trust to their son, the higher is the ratio of L/G that means the risk is higher. Once the value of P reach to a certain level, the aged would choose other systems. In the long slight, the son-provide for aged would be replaced by social and other systems.