Abstract

This paper seeks to explain the dearth of females in the population of China in cohorts born from the late 1930s to the present. We demonstrate that in virtually all cohorts. the shortage of females in comparison with males is revealed when the cohort is first enumerated in a census. Subsequently it barely changes, an indication that female losses occur very early in life. Using the high-quality data from the censuses and fertility surveys in China, we show that many of the births of the girls missing in the censuses were not reported in the surveys because they died very young. The incidence of excess early female mortality (probably infanticide) declined precipitously in the Communist period, but not to zero. The recent escalation in the proportion of young females missing in China has been caused largely by rapidly escalating sex-selective abortion.

Birth Order, Marital Fertility, Female Mortality, Fertility Survey, Model Life Table
The text of this article is only available as a PDF.

References

Coale, A.J. 1984. “Rapid Population Change in China, 1952–1982.” Report No. 27, National Research Council, Committee on Population and Demography.
Coale, A.J. 1993. “Mortality Schedules in China Derived from Data in the 1982 and 1990 Censuses.” Working Paper 93-7, Office of Population Research.
Coale, A.J., & Demeny, P. (
1983
).
Regional Model Life Tables and Stable Populations
. 2nd Ed.
New York
:
Academic Press
.
Google Scholar
 
Coale, A.J., & Li, S. (
1991
).
The Effect of Age Misreporting in China on the Calculation of Mortality Rates at Very High Ages
.
Demography
,
28
,
293
–
301
. 10.2307/2061281
Google Scholar
Crossref
Search ADS
PubMed
 
Vital Statistics of Japan
. (
1991
).
Tokyo
:
Statistics and Information Department
.
Johanssen, S., & Nygren, O. (
1991
).
The Missing Girls in China: A New Demographic Account
.
Population and Development Review
,
17
(
1
),
35
–
51
. 10.2307/1972351
Google Scholar
Crossref
Search ADS
 
Lavely, W.R. (
1986
).
Age Patterns of Chinese Marital Fertility, 1950-1981
.
Demography
,
23
,
419
–
34
. 10.2307/2061439
Google Scholar
Crossref
Search ADS
PubMed
 
Muhuri, P.K., & Preston, S.H. (
1991
).
Effects of Family Composition on Mortality Differentials by Sex Among Children in Matlab, Bangladesh
.
Population and Development Review
,
17
(
3
),
415
–
34
. 10.2307/1971948
Google Scholar
Crossref
Search ADS
 
Recent Changes in Vital Statistics and New Population Projection
. (
1988
).
Seoul
:
National Bureau of Statistics
.
Shim, Y.H., Park, S.M., Kim, H.S., & Pack, W.S. (
1991
).
An Empirical Study on Abortion in Korea
.
Seoul
:
Korean Institute of Criminology
.
Google Scholar
 
Data of China Fertility and Contraception Survey (Whole Country)
. (
1990
).
Beijing
:
China Population Press
.
10 Percent Sampling Tabulation on the 1990 Population Census of the People’s Republic of China
. (
1991
).
Beijing
:
China Statistical Press
.
Teitelbaum, M.S., Mantel, N., & Stark, C.R. (
1971
).
Limited Dependence of the Human Sex Ratio on Birth Order
.
American Journal of Human Genetics
,
23
(
3
),
271
–
280
.
Google Scholar
PubMed
 
Wolf, A.P., & Huang, C. (
1980
).
Marriages and Adoption in China, 1845–1945
.
Stanford
:
Stanford University Press
.
Google Scholar
 
Yi, Z., P. Tu, B. Gu, Y. Xu, B. Li, and Y. Li. 1992. “An Analysis of the Causes and Implications of the Recent Increase in the Sex Ratio at Birth in China.” Presented at the International Seminar on China’s 1990 Population Census, Beijing.
Yi, Z., Tu, P., Gu, B., Xu, Y., Li, B., & Li, Y. (
1993
).
Causes and Implications of the Recent Increase in the Reported Sex Ratio at Birth in China
.
Population and Development Review
,
19
(
2
),
283
–
302
. 10.2307/2938438
Google Scholar
Crossref
Search ADS
 
© Population Association of America 1994
1994