Social ties, spatial migration paradigm, and mental health among two generations of migrants in China

Abstract

Despite emerging literature on the effects of cross‐border ties on international immigration's mental health, research concerning China's internal migrants' mental health remains scarce. After 40 years of China's “one‐child policy,” new‐generation migrants (born after 1980) have been found to have poorer mental health status. With smaller family structures, previous studies found that new‐generation migrants are more likely to be affected by migration‐related stresses, with social ties having mixed effects on their mental health. In this paper, we examine the effects of local ties (in host cities) and trans‐local ties (in the migrants' original home location) on China's rural and urban migrants' mental health by using a national‐level survey data comprising N = 16,000 participants. We focus on whether these relationships vary among the four categories of migrants—grouped according to their place of origin and date of birth. The study results show that both local and trans‐local “kinship” ties have positive effects on migrants' mental health, whereas participation in organisation or activities have negative effects. In addition, new‐generation migrants were found to have relatively poor mental health, being more easily affected by trans‐local kinship ties. Moreover, participation in local activities had more significant adverse influence on interprovincial floating migrants, who had poorer mental health than the intraprovincial group. The study deciphered underlying negative health consequences attributed to the one‐child policy and calls for intraprovincial mobility with local urbanisation. The study concludes that social integration of new‐generation migrants can act as a protective intervention aimed at enhancing the mental capital of Chinese cities.