Research On Social Support Networks Of Urban Older Childless People

The aging of the population is one of the core issues in China.In the future,with the changes in the population age structure in China,the great change will also happen in the social and economic development and system construction.Under this background,there are endless researches on the living conditions and demands of various types of the old.Older childless people are different from the empty-nester or older adults living alone which has been studied by many researchers in China.They are lacking in child support permanently,which is very special.The phenomenon of older childless people is valued by many countries with low fertility rates.At present,China has entered the ranks of low-fertility countries,and with the transformation of society and changes in demographic structure,from the perspective of international experience and long-term development,it is of great significance to focus on the older childless people study.This study takes the urban older childless people in Shanghai as the research object,using literature analysis,semi-structured interviews,community visits and other research methods.Based on the above,NVIVO software is applied to encode and analyze the interview texts,from formal support and informal support to reflect the characteristics and construction process of the social support networks,so as to further understand the living conditions and demands of the older childless people.The main findings of this study are as follows: First,the demand for urban older childless people is mainly the uncertain old-age or disabled care needs in the future.The older childless people without child support are faced with confusion.Second,the social support network for the older childless people presents the characteristics of formal support lacking pertinence and informal support expansion.From the point of view of formal support,each subject provides a certain degree of support,but compared with the actual demand,there is still a certain gap and imbalance between supply and demand,and the formal support still needs to be strengthened;from the view of informal support,it presents the pattern of collateral kinship support and peer group support,and plays an important role in economic support,spiritual comfort and daily care.Third,the construction process of the informal support network for the older childless people is mainly based on the below.The rich daily life of the older childless people further enhances the scale and closeness of their social relationship network.Through parental recognition,the older childless people establish a substitute for child support.With the formal support of the communities,the stability and strength of the informal support network have been further strengthened.In this process,different demographic characteristics have influenced the choices of the older childless people,and also made a certain difference in the process of network construction.