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I've heard that in China the situation is changing. Women are relatively scarce, so the groom's family often has to pony up a substantial "bride price" (reverse

I've heard that in China the situation is changing. Women are relatively scarce, so the groom's family often has to pony up a substantial "bride price" (reverse dowry?). This is helping to balance out the "value" of boys and girls.

huherto 17y ago
So in 20 years is going to be a surplus of women?
- quantumhobbit 17y ago
  I know this is weird but I want to try and model this effect mathematically. The new gender ratio driven by a function of the current gender ratio for 20-somethings. Too many boys, would lead to girls and vice versa. There would likely be a damping effect of cultural inertia that would prevent rapid oscillations. I suppose one would also have to take in to account intergenerational marriages, death rates .etc.
  - nostrademons 17y ago
    This is how the sex ratio got to 50% in the first place, evolutionarily. If there's an excess of women, men will find it relatively easier to find a mate, and so women whose genes cause them to bear an excess of sons will pass more of those genes down into the third generation. If there's an excess of men, men will find it relatively hard to find a mate, and so women whose genes cause them to bear an excess of daughters will pass more genes onto the third generation. It balances out at a 50/50 steady-state. Curiously, the sex ratio can get skewed by environmental conditions, in a manner similar to what you describe. Men have more reproductive variability than women - the number of children a woman can bear is largely limited by her uterus, while the number of children a man can bear is limited by the number of women he can convince to sleep with him. So when times are good, or if a mother is high-status within her particular group, she tends to bear more sons to take advantage of their reproductive success. While when times are lean, mothers tend to bear more daughters. A similar effect occurs on the level of individual traits. Couple who carry genes that disproportionately affect the reproductive success of one sex tend to have more children of that sex. For example, someone did a study of Hollywood actors, and found out that 60% of their children are daughters - presumably because Hollywood actors are better-looking than average, and beauty benefits girls more than boys. Taller and more muscular parents tend to have more sons, etc. And what's the mechanism for this, since everyone knows sex is carried on the male's Y-chromosome, and women shouldn't be able to influence it? Sex-selective abortion. Apparently, females of most mammalian species will absorb the blastocyst into the womb (or otherwise abort very-early-stage fetuses) if environmental conditions aren't right for a child of that sex. So China and India are just using technology to do what biology has done for tens of millions of years.
telegraph 17y ago
I'm having trouble finding the source (it was in the NYTimes a few months ago), but China has also undertaken a pretty sizable PR campaign encouraging people to have daughters to try and address the ridiculously skewed gender ratios, especially in rural areas (sometimes as high as 2:1 for males).
- GiraffeNecktie 17y ago
  Probably this article in the WSJ: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415971813687173.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415971813687173.html
perneto 17y ago
It's worth noting that the practice of the groom's family paying the bride's family is nothing new in China - at least according to my flatmates from Hong Kong. The rationale is that the parents invested time and money into their daughter's upbringing, but since she's leaving their family to join the groom's, she won't be supporting them in their old years. There's still no pension system in HK - there's one in mainland China though.

huherto 17y ago

So in 20 years is going to be a surplus of women?

quantumhobbit 17y ago
I know this is weird but I want to try and model this effect mathematically. The new gender ratio driven by a function of the current gender ratio for 20-somethings. Too many boys, would lead to girls and vice versa. There would likely be a damping effect of cultural inertia that would prevent rapid oscillations. I suppose one would also have to take in to account intergenerational marriages, death rates .etc.
- nostrademons 17y ago
  This is how the sex ratio got to 50% in the first place, evolutionarily. If there's an excess of women, men will find it relatively easier to find a mate, and so women whose genes cause them to bear an excess of sons will pass more of those genes down into the third generation. If there's an excess of men, men will find it relatively hard to find a mate, and so women whose genes cause them to bear an excess of daughters will pass more genes onto the third generation. It balances out at a 50/50 steady-state. Curiously, the sex ratio can get skewed by environmental conditions, in a manner similar to what you describe. Men have more reproductive variability than women - the number of children a woman can bear is largely limited by her uterus, while the number of children a man can bear is limited by the number of women he can convince to sleep with him. So when times are good, or if a mother is high-status within her particular group, she tends to bear more sons to take advantage of their reproductive success. While when times are lean, mothers tend to bear more daughters. A similar effect occurs on the level of individual traits. Couple who carry genes that disproportionately affect the reproductive success of one sex tend to have more children of that sex. For example, someone did a study of Hollywood actors, and found out that 60% of their children are daughters - presumably because Hollywood actors are better-looking than average, and beauty benefits girls more than boys. Taller and more muscular parents tend to have more sons, etc. And what's the mechanism for this, since everyone knows sex is carried on the male's Y-chromosome, and women shouldn't be able to influence it? Sex-selective abortion. Apparently, females of most mammalian species will absorb the blastocyst into the womb (or otherwise abort very-early-stage fetuses) if environmental conditions aren't right for a child of that sex. So China and India are just using technology to do what biology has done for tens of millions of years.

telegraph 17y ago

I'm having trouble finding the source (it was in the NYTimes a few months ago), but China has also undertaken a pretty sizable PR campaign encouraging people to have daughters to try and address the ridiculously skewed gender ratios, especially in rural areas (sometimes as high as 2:1 for males).

GiraffeNecktie 17y ago
Probably this article in the WSJ: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415971813687173.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415971813687173.html

perneto 17y ago

It's worth noting that the practice of the groom's family paying the bride's family is nothing new in China - at least according to my flatmates from Hong Kong. The rationale is that the parents invested time and money into their daughter's upbringing, but since she's leaving their family to join the groom's, she won't be supporting them in their old years. There's still no pension system in HK - there's one in mainland China though.