Thanks to their ethnic status and geographical closeness between Korea and China, Korean Chinese in China, called “Joseonjok,” often migrate and re-migrate between two countries. They, in many cases, maintain family relationship across a national border; the parents work abroad (in Korea) and their children remain in the home country. Prior studies have reported that the children of parents who migrate have much difficulty in social psychological adaptation, leading them to have depression, fail to adapt to school, or show deviant behaviors. However, scholars know little about the children of Korean-Chinese transnational families in China.
Drawing upon survey data on youth children who live in Yanbian Autonomous Prefecture in China, this study examines what effects transnationl traits of families have on social and psychological adaptation of children. It also explores whether individual, familial, and social resources of the children have moderating effects on the adaptation. Finally, latent profile analysis is utilized to identify adaptation profiles in the study population and examines differential factors to affect each profile. The study analyzes the data from “Survey of Korean-Chinese Adolescents in China” which was conducted by Korea University and Yanbian University, from September to November, 2014. The data were collected from Korean-Chinese students in middle and high schools at eight districts in Yanbian Autonomous Prefecture, using quota sampling by gender, type of school, school year, and region. Among 3,000 respondents, 2,727 were selected for the analysis after excluding those whose parents live in the other parts of China and those with missing responses in the questionnaire.
This study focuses its analysis on three aspects. First, the degree of adaptation among the Korean-Chines youths differ by the migration patterns of the parents, such as migration period, family structure, and parenting style. The longer mothers, rather than fathers, stay abroad, the stronger their children are affected negatively by parental absence. That is, fathers’ absence due to migration has less impact on social and psychological adaptation of their children. It suggests that fathers’ relationship with their children and parenting style, rather than their presence itself, matter; the patriarchal way of upbringing among Korean-Chinese fathers offset the absence of father. In addition, the children’s adaptation differs by family structure. Depressive symptoms and deviant behaviors are higher among those whose parents both migrated and return to China than other counterparts. School adaptation is worse among those whose father or mother is absent. Regarding parenting style, the more frequently the parents spent time with their children when visiting home, the better their children are adaptive.
Second, individual, familial, and social resources have moderating effects on the association of parental absence with the youth children’s adaptation. For individual resources, self-esteem moderates the adverse effect of parental absence on the youth children’s depressive symptoms only among the youths whose mother migrated, whereas self-efficacy has a moderating effect only among those whose father migrated. Familial and social resources – parental bonding, family cohesion, and relative support - moderate significantly the negative impact of parental absence on the youth’s delinquency, only among those whose parents both migrated and return to China. Findings hint that these resources compensate for broken family structure, leading to lower depressive symptoms and fewer deviant behaviors. Social policies promoting individual, familial, and social resources are recommended to facilitate the adaptation of the Korean-Chines youths of transnational families.
Third, this study uses latent profile analysis to identify five adaptation profiles and examines differential factors to affect each profile. The depression-maladaptive and delinquency-maladaptive groups consist of 15 percent of the total sample. Findings reveal that transnational family structure have a negative impact among the youths whose parents migrated and return only in the delinquency-maladaptive group. Self-esteem, family cohesion, and relative support have positive effects among both depression-maladaptive and delinquency-maladaptive groups. This suggests that resilient resources play a crucial role in alleviating maladaptation of the youths of transnational families.
In short, findings call for the need for social support to enhance better adaptation of Korean-Chinese youths of transnational families. Particularly, the social policies and programs are needed to maintain family cohesion and facilitate alternative care networks for the Korean-Chinese families.