The stereotypes of motherhood in Chinese parent-child reality shows

Contents:

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

3. Methodology:

Qualitative procedure

Quantitative procedure

4. Result and analysis:

The stereotype of motherhood in housekeeping

The stereotype of motherhood in child rearing

The stereotype of motherhood in careers

5. Limitation

6. Conclusion

7. Reference

1. Introduction

Since parent-child reality show firstly introduced in China in 2013, this kind of reality show has become very popular among Chinese audiences. In this paper, we have selected two typical parent-child reality shows, the Dad Came Back and Super Mom for their similar programme settings. These two reality shows are the reality shows that observe the daily lives of participating families without any arranged task and interference. Dad Came Back is a show focusing on fatherhood while Super Mom shows the motherhood. Through these two reality show, audiences can see how the motherhood and fatherhood are established and the different concepts of childcare.

This paper aims at analyzing the stereotypes of motherhood in Chinese parent-child reality shows on TV. This is an important issue because media has great influence on public opinion. Furthermore, women are an important part of labor force and the identity of “Mother” should not be an obstacle on female independence, especially their career. Gender equality is a reflection of social progress and every family member is equal on family division.

This paper argues that Chinese parent-child reality shows indicate the stereotypes of motherhood in housekeeping, child rearing, and career, influenced by people’s gender perception, family income, and living environment. The result of our research will go through the media representation of mothers and fathers in parent-child reality shows and the public stereotype led by parent-child reality shows. Questionnaires about the public image of mother and the comments and idea on the parent-child reality shows will also be counted.

2. Literature Review

Compared with traditional paper media, film and television have a much faster and wider dissemination speed. Therefore, gender concept and gender image created in film and television works are highly related to the stereotypes of the public. In the past few decades, the image of a mother in Chinese media is mostly a gentle, selfless and careful person. ( Dezeng, 2017). “Mother” is always regarded as a role in a family rather than an identity of a woman. The continuously employed mother who was satisfied with working outside of the home was perceived as less committed to motherhood and more selfish. (Gorman, 2002)

In the media representation aspect, the stereotype of mother is usually revealing that the mother is the major force bounding to housekeeping and child rearing. The mother images presented in the current film and television works are mainly family-centered. At present, these film and television works all set up twists and turns of the storylines to show the greatness of the mothers. (Jinmei, 2009) The realization of mothers’ own values depends on others and they are measured by the ability to take care of other family members, especially their children and the elderly. In most people’s stereotypes, woman's career is never portrayed as more important to her than marriage and family. (Kuperberg & Stone 2008) The traditional ethical orientation and the stereotyped image make the “mother” an effective representation of the social interpretation of male values.

It is a big challenge for a woman to establish a positive image in her career along with the identity of being a “mother”. In 1970s, the emergence of "the new momism" was exemplified by increasing attention to intensive mothering (Hays 1996) and illustrated primarily by ubiquitous images of stay-at-home moms. Furthermore, between 1987 and 1997, women's magazines ran an increasing number of negative articles about working mothers and child care options, including several day care horror stories. (Kuperberg & Stone 2008) Accoring to The Feminine Mystique in 1983 , women with careers were virtually absent from the pages of women's magazines of the 1950s and 1960s and that women with jobs were frequently portrayed as giving them up.( Friedan, 1983) Fuether more, in the analysis of the images of adults appearing in the 516 television commercials, we found that the ratio of male to female characters in this family image respectively, 18.1% and 40.5%, while the proportion of men and women in this category of occupation is 61.3% and 24.0%. (Jinmei, 2009)

A number of scholars have discussed the stereotypes and images of motherhood in film and TV dramas. However, there are no relevant academic articles focusing on the stereotypes of motherhood in Chinese the parent-child reality shows when these shows have such a high degree of attention among Chinese audiences.

3. Methodology

In order to conduct an exhaustive analysis of the stereotypes of motherhood in Chinese parent-child reality shows, the researchers of this study used both quantitative and qualitative methods to look into the stereotypes and assess the current situation. First, the researchers analyzed the content of two Chinese parent-child reality shows and identified the stereotypes reflected in the reality shows. Then, researchers conducted an online survey in order to obtain the information about current situation from the respondents and analyzed the influence factors of the motherhood stereotype.

• Qualitative procedure

The qualitative procedure concentrated on finding the stereotypes of motherhood reflected in Chinese parent-child reality shows, so the content analysis method was used in this section, to look at two reality shows, Super Mom and Dad Came Back. Super Mom records how celebrity mothers take care of their children, while Dad came back shows how celebrity fathers spend time with their children. The researchers analyzed the reality shows and identified the stereotypes by bullet screen (real-time comments from netizens), the performance, the conversation or interviews of the participants, voice overs and the background music used in the programs. Then, based on these, the researchers classified the stereotypes into different categories. For example, Huang Shengyi, one of the mothers participated in Super mom, did not know how to cook, and some comments from some netizens were “As a mother, how could you do not cook?”, “How do women do not know how to cook?” “Don’t you feel ashamed?” The researchers categorized the comments into the stereotype of mothers who must be good at housekeeping and be responsible for most of the housework.

• Quantitative procedure

In order to have a better understanding of the current status of motherhood in China and acquire people’s attitudes, researchers conducted an online survey. This survey aims to find out what the stereotypes and the influence factors of motherhood in China are. Respondents filled out the questionnaire in Wechat Moment, and researchers sifted through the response and retained the necessary data. The survey questions are below.

1. Gender: Female or male

2. Living environment: City or countryside/suburb

3. Family income (annually):

Under 12,000

12,000-30,000

30,000-60,000

60,000-120,000

Over 120,000

4. Education background:

Primary school/Middle school

High school

Vocational schools

Bachelor degree

Above Bachelor degree

For the first four questions, researchers wanted to know some background information on the respondents, and analyze how these factors influence the motherhood stereotypes. The second question is related to living environment, in order to not confuse our respondents, we provided the definition about city, countryside and suburb for respondents to pinpoint. The countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities, with a low population density and smaller settlements than the inner-city areas. Agricultural areas are common in the countryside, as are other types of areas such as forests. A suburb is a mixed-use or residential area, existing either as part of a city or urban area or as a separate residential community within commuting distance of a city.

5. Who does most of the housework in your family？

Mom or Dad

6. Who usually takes care of the children in your family?

Mom or Dad

7. Did your mom quit work to take care of you？

Yes, or No

8. Have your family members ever asked you to give up a career to take care of children? (or have this preference)

Yes, or No

By asking these four questions, the researchers aimed at acquiring the current situation in respondents’ families relating to motherhood, such as labor division, thus allowing the stereotypes reflected by this.

9. Do you think it is normal that fathers are flustered and less likely to take good care of children on the parent-children reality shows?

Normal or abnormal

10. Some mothers are attacked with abusive comments as they do not know how to take care of children in the parent-children reality shows. What are the reasons?

· It is widely believed that children nurturing is mother’s duty.

· It is widely believed that the celebrities are too busy to take care of babies.

· Netizens are too harsh and mothers should not be accused.

These two questions are related to parent-children reality shows in China. The researchers aimed to collect the respondent’s attitudes on the content of reality shows, thus categorizing some stereotypes reflected by this.

11. Many females give up their career for raising the children in the society. What the reasons do you think are?

12. Father-child reality shows on TV are popular in China recently. What the reasons do you think are?

The last two are open questions, by collecting and categorizing the response into different stereotypes, the researchers conducted an in-depth analysis, combining it with the content in the qualitative procedure.

4. Result and analysis

After conducting the content analysis and survey research in our methodology, and referenced some of the relevant studies that we found in our database, we identified our argument. Our paper holds that Chinese parent-child reality shows indicate the stereotypes of motherhood in housekeeping, child rearing, and career, influenced by people’s gender perception, family income, and living environment. In our survey research, we finally got 293 respondents and answers. Housekeeping and childcare have been considered as the nature of mother and women’s fulfillment were mostly realized by their role of housewives instead of their career achievements since 1960s (Arielle & Pamela, 2008).

• The stereotype of motherhood in housekeeping

A woman can spend time working-perhaps even at a nontraditional job-as long as she keeps the house clean and her husband and children well-tended (Poloma & Garland, 1971; Russo & Brackbill, 1973; Russo, Note 1). Women are more likely to be considered to bear the burden of housekeeping both in society and in home life.

In the Super mom reality show, Huang Shengyi was labeled as a “black hole mother” (to describe she did not know much things) as she was not skilled in cooking and netizens commented on her that she is “a shame of being a mother.” It indicates the stereotype that mothers must be skilled in doing housework, even though she is a celebrity with a tight schedule. However, netizens tend to have more tolerance and patience with celebrity fathers in the same situation. Most of the fathers who participated in the Dad came back have no idea how to cook, leaving the kitchen messy and waiting for their wives to tidy it up. People did not post negative comments about fathers like they did when judged mothers. It indicates the stereotype that doing housework is an obligation for mothers, but voluntary for fathers. Men and women may disagree on the characteristics of the ideal woman, but there has generally been a consensus that the major goal of a woman’s life is to raise well-adjusted children (Griffith, 1973; Laws, 1971; Steinmann & Fox, 1966)

No matter stay-at-home or working, mothers are supposed to undertake more housework than fathers. In the survey, most of the housework in respondents’ families was done by mothers, with an overwhelming percentage shown in the Table 1. This result indicates that mothers undertake more housework than fathers do, and that indeed exists in most of the Chinese families.

Table 1 shows that about 86.81% of the respondents hold the opinion that mothers do most of the housework in their families.

• The stereotype of motherhood in child rearing

Mothers dedicate their life to their children and are held almost entirely responsible (Lawrence & Marilyn, 1995). Women are portrayed and considered to be exclusively involve in taking care of their children at home (Arielle & Pamela, 2008). Women’s roles in society are and have been looked at as tending and nurturing their children in home life.

Mothers are the authorities of child rearing and are supposed to know more about taking care of their own children. In the very beginning of the reality show Dad Came Back, a voice-over stated: “Compared with the mother who was pregnant for 10 months, the father is the one who is at a loss at the moment that the child was born.” It presents the stereotype that fathers take less responsibility in the whole process of giving birth to the children and after the children are born. Fathers are considered as holding less knowledge in taking care of their children. In most of the families that participate in this reality show, before leaving the house, mothers told their husbands to follow the routine of their kids, and most of the kids were unwilling to separate with their moms. In addition, respondents from our survey also think that mother is the one who usually takes care of the children in the family, according to Table 2. It can be seen that in most of the situations, mothers have higher levels of participation in their children’s growth and development than fathers. Children are considered to have more attachment to their mothers than fathers as well, because mothers tend to spend more time with their children. Child rearing is the most frequently and commonly mentioned activity by most of the mothers (Arielle & Pamela, 2008). A very typical script on the show was said by Zheng Jun: “It is very difficult for me and my son to be alone. I have never tried that.” This script eventually showed that fathers seldom participate in taking care of their own children, therefore, most of the fathers show terrible skills in nurturing their children at home.

Table 2 shows that about 92% of the respondents hold the opinion that mothers are the main participants in child rearing in the families.

Mothers who are not skilled in taking care of their children are blamed by the general public and the audiences in the Super Mom reality show. Most of the mothers, like Huang Shengyi, Hu Ke, and Bao Wenjing, did not do a good job on the reality show, and received negative comments in the bullet screen, such as “a shame of being a mother”. The society has placed too much blame and responsibility on mothers in family functioning (Lawrence & Marilyn, 1995). Mothers on the reality show are not considered to be so-called “good mothers”, who will almost spend most of their lifetime around their children. However, if fathers are not skilled at child rearing, nobody would blame them for that. Almost all of the fathers who participate in the show didn’t know how to dress their children, or change the diapers, they showed less patient in taking care of their children, etc. In our survey, we further researched on people’s attitudes of what they think about fathers’ skills of taking care of their children on Dad Came Back. The result is not surprising that up to half of the people think that it is a normal phenomenon, as can be seen in the Table 3. It somehow reflects that people in the society subconsciously think that fathers are less active in the children care (Gail, 2004).

The respondents in our survey research also give reasons for why this kind of father-child reality show attracts many Chinese audiences. Most of the people in survey think that this kind of show is new and rare, because they seldom know about how fathers would take care of children when they are together alone in the house, and it is funny to see these celebrity fathers are in a mess, which reminds these fathers that it is not an easy job taking care of babies. Others respondents also mentioned that this kind of show makes people start to think about the unequal distribution on child rearing in families, as the fathers enjoy less participation in childcare. Therefore, people need to realize that fathers also have to share responsibility in taking care of children.

Table 3 shows that over a half of the respondents in our survey think it is normal for fathers not skilled in child rearing.

• The stereotype of motherhood in careers

Related to what has been discussed above, in the survey, most of the people think that the reason why these celebrity mothers are blamed by the audiences is that they focus too much on their work instead of taking care of their family and children. This result shows that most of the people tend to think that women need to put their family in the first place, as can be seen in Table 4. The media description of women is exclusively focused on family rather than work, even though in the 21st century and the depiction of working women has been increased in a large number (Arielle & Pamela, 2008). On the Super Mum reality show, Sha Yi complained about his wife Hu Ke on the show that it was bad for her getting less time to accompany their child because Hu was busy with work. It indicates the stereotype that most of the people, not only Sha Yi, will take for granted that women need to sacrifice their working for family functioning.

The name of the reality show, Super Mum also hints that mothers are superwomen when they both do a good job in working and in taking care of their family, as the mothers who participate on the reality show are all movie stars or singers who are busy with their work. Not only for the celebrity mothers, ordinary mothers in the society always face a choice between choosing stay-home and working. It has become a recognizable culture type that some working mothers put family over their careers (Arielle & Pamela, 2008). In our survey research, we found that almost most of the respondents think mothers should both take responsibility for family and career in Table 5. However, fathers seldom need to keep a balance between these two aspects (Kristina & Barbara, 2002).

Table 4 showed that the mothers in the reality are blamed because they focus too much on work.

Table 5 shows that about 82% of the respondents think that mothers need to balance their family and career.

Our paper also segments the respondents who participate in our survey into three categories, gender perception, family income, and living environment, in order to find out what factors influence people’s portray of motherhood in women’ career.

People’s gender perception. In Table 6, we found that among the female respondents, most of them chose rather balance their family and career or pursue their career. However, among the male respondents, most of them still to think that women need to give up work for their families. The expectation for mothers is too much because people expect women to be both good mothers and good employees. In most of the situations, the reasons that women gave for quitting work are mostly focusing on their families (Kuperberg & Stone, 2008). It is always the woman who is the first person for sacrificing her professional achievements. Fathers or men seldom need to choose between their work and their family.

Table 6 shows that compared to female respondents, male respondents are more likely to think that mothers should stay home and give up their work.

People’s family income. In Table 7, we discovered that people from families with different levels of income have various perspectives on mothers’ careers. In this chart, we only focus on the people who think women should give up their work for families. It is obvious that these people are mainly from the lowest income families, who earn less than 1.2 million per year, and the highest income families, who earn up to 1.2 million per year. In the Chinese history, it is not surprising that women usually are considered to actualize their value as the identities of being mothers, instead of successful businessmen, politicians and other career achievements, even though they may come from rich families. Working mothers are seen as less effective parents than nonworking mothers (Tyler & Madeline, 2012).

Table 7 shows that among those who think mothers should stay home, respondents from the lowest and highest income families occupied the majority.

People’s living environment. In Table 8, we also found that people’s living environment also affect their attitudes towards rather mothers should stay home or work. The result shows that people from the urban area give more support for mothers to pursue careers, while people from the suburb area expect mothers to quit works and stay home. People from the suburb area or rural area have more traditional thinking and believe the nature of women is motherhood (Gail, 2004). In ancient China, women are considered to stay home and focus on family functioning, while fathers should go out to work and earn money. It has embedded in our culture in China and it was hard to change. People from the urban area may have more stress in the family financial functioning, therefore, they need mothers to go out for work as one of the sources of the family income.

Table 8 shows that people from the suburb area tend to think that mothers should give up works for their families.

5. Limitation

Although the researchers tried to achieve an exhaustive study by using content analysis and survey analysis method, it still exists some limitations in this study. First, the samples collected by questionnaire are not sufficient. With only 293 respondents filling out the questionnaire, it could not generate a comprehensive and typical answer. Second, homosexual and transgender are not inclusive in the gender options given, although same-sex marriage is still illegal in China. Also, the situation of single-family is not under consideration, but we can’t guarantee all the respondents’ family intact. Third, it is very common that grandparents take care of their grandchildren in China, however, the research questions in this study only focus on motherhood and fatherhood, so grandparents are exclusive in the options given, leading some inaccurate response. Similarly, the maid or babysitter is not inclusive in our options.

6. Conclusion:

By the content analysis of Dad Came Back and Super Mom, and the survey research of the public in our study, we hold an opinion that Chinese parent-child reality shows did hint the stereotypes of motherhood on television. Our paper categorizes the literature into 4 aspects, which are the social status of women, the stereotypes of mothers, women’s career situations, and the media representation of mothers in China. Therefore, we aim to get an overall and general idea of what did Chinese parent-child reality shows indicate the stereotypes of motherhood, because there is no specific study research on this field so far. Through analysis of the results got from the methodology, we hold that Chinese parent-child reality shows indicate the stereotypes of motherhood in housekeeping, child rearing, and career, influenced by people’s gender perception, family income, and living environment.

The results of our content analysis have great similarities with the results of our survey research. It conforms to the cultivation theory that watching television influences the audiences’ ideas and perceptions of everyday life. The stereotypes of motherhood in the media reflect and indicate how people label motherhood in the society, while The stereotypes of motherhood in the society are influenced by the media representation. The media tends to present women’s identities as mothers, whose values are actualized and recognized mostly by their contribution to children or family functioning in the society.

Our study has certain limitations, which includes the small sample in our survey respondents, the variables that hard to control in our questionnaire, and the diversity of the families in China. Research scale should be increased in the further study, including enlarging the research sample and the types of reality shows in China.

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