A Study On Family Support Of Old Age In Rural Areas In Changing Society

Many researches on family support of old age had been made in the field of sociology in our country. These researches described the current situation of the life of the old age and explored its cause and change tendency.Most scholars studied the old age both in rural areas and cities,but they did not put emphasis on the old age in rural areas. Furthermore, the researches on family support of old age studied the family status of the old by analysing the family relationships. These researches did not describe the inward world and daily life of the old in detail. On the other hand, these researches did not point out the challenges made by the change of family structure,family scale and family relationships as well as the effect of the challenges.In my opinion,with the transformation of economic and political system, great changes have taken place in social structure and all aspects of social life. These changes caused the transformation of the local life and value orientation of different people. Thus, the interaction between diffferent persons ,especialy the interaction between the old and the next generation also changed much. The change made the old in a inferrior position,which caused some difficulties in their life. The old in rural areas are in a weaker position than those in cities because of special social reasons and their own conditions. To some extent,they can be treated as a certain disadvantaged group that is in great need of full attention. Through a number of surveys and case ,the author felt the hardships of life of the old in rural areas and reflected the reasons for this situation. By reflection and detailed empirical research, the author found that the life of the old in rural areas was in a serious situation.The situation has arisen not only with the old people's terms and conditions that are related,but also with profound social, economic and cultural background factors, these factors include: the impact of traditional culture,the low economic level, the rising of the right for indiviual autonomy, the increase in public system deficiency,and so on.The change of the social , economic and cultural conditions made the traditional"feedback"type old-age model facing with many challenges. The"feedback"type old-age model based on the possession and control of the family property and the traditional family ethics. With the great changes of society these two conditions are gradually disappearing, but in our country we do not have the necessary economic and cultural conditions for the wetern"relay"style old-age model. This made the family support of old-age facing with some difficulties.In order to reveal in the rural aeras,particularly backward rural areas, the challenges that facing with the traditional"feedback"type old-age model,which can enable us to better understand the material and spiritual life of the rural elderly ,the author mainly discussed the impact on family support of old age that made by the changes of the rural land management system,labour mobility ,as well as the changes in family structure ,matital relations and cultural values.In this article, the author explored this question not only beginning with macro social, economic and cultural life ,but also combining the changes of the individual thought and behavior patterns.