Missing Girls: An Evaluation of Sex Ratios in China

1. Missing Girls: • An Evaluation of Sex Ratios in China Abstract: Descriptive Statistics: Year, Recorded Sex Ratio in China, 1960-1987 Variable N Mean Median TrMean StDev SE Mean Year 28 1973.5 1973.5 1973.5 8.2 1.6 Sex ratio 28 107.41 106.85 107.41 2.27 0.43 Variable Minimum Maximum Q1 Q3 Year 1960.0 1987.0 1966.3 1980.8 Sex ratio 102.50 112.30 106.23 108.35 As humanitarian and gender equality issues have been gaining more attention in the last several decades, so to has China. Infamous for its one child policy, Chinese cultural and economic traditions are based largely upon the idea of primogeniture, or the passing one of property from a father to his eldest son. A nation that has struggled with overpopulation for the past few generations, China has seen a fall in the recorded birthrates of female children since the government’s implementation of the one child policy in 1979. http://www.gendercide.org/case_infanticide.html Regression Analysis: Sex ratio versus Year The regression equation is Sex ratio = - 47 + 0.0782 Year Predictor Coef SE Coef T P Constant -47.0 102.4 -0.46 0.650 Year 0.07824 0.05189 1.51 0.144 S = 2.218 R-Sq = 8.0% R-Sq(adj) = 4.5% Analysis of Variance Source DF SS MS F P Regression 1 11.185 11.185 2.27 0.144 Residual Error 26 127.902 4.919 Total 27 139.087 Unusual Observations Obs Year Sex rati Fit SE Fit Residual St Resid 7 1966 112.200 106.824 0.572 5.376 2.51R 9 1968 102.500 106.980 0.507 -4.480 -2.08R R denotes an observation with a large standardized residual Figure 1 Annual Sex Ratios among live births, Sweden 1750-1989, 21 year moving average, and 95 percent confidence limits allowing for linear trend Sex Ratios Among Live Births in China, 1960-87 Introduction: Regression Plot In March 1991 a team of Norwegian statisticians, headed by Sten Johansson and Ola Nygren published an in the Population and Developmental Review, an article entitled, “The Missing Girls of China: A New Demographic Account”. The article outlines a study of the birthrates of girl babies in China, comparing the sex ratio of recorded birthrates in China between 1980 and 1987 to a control based on the recorded sex ratios of birthrates in Norway over a period of 240 years beginning in 1749. Birthrates are the number of male births for every one hundred female births. Figure 2 Discussion: Sex Ratios Among Reported Live Births in China, 1981-87, Within an Outside Local Birth Plans according to the 1988 two-per thousand Fertility Survey Conclusion: Using a regression analysis I concluded that the differences between sex ratio among live in China from 1960-87 were not statistically significant and the mean sex ratio was 107.4 males to every one hundred females born. 1966 and 1968 were outliers with the birthrate measuring 112.2 males to 100 females in 1966 and 102.5 males to 100 females in 1968. These erratic birth rates have been called less reliable by the authors of the study. In Figure 1 the authors of the study use a more sophisticated and complex score to compute the confidence limits for the birthrate information for Sweden. I used the confidence limits that we are familiar with from class to prepare Figure 3 and found that my results using linear regression yielded a wider range for the confidence limits and than the equation used by the authors in Figure 1 when applied to the same information. Thus, the leaders of this study employed a more complex equation in order to obtain more precise results. Sex ratios in China are important because of the sensitive gender issues imbued in the culture. Although an analysis of the sex ratios in China from 1960-87 reveal that there is not a statistically significant relationship between sex and and a given year, there is a difference between the sex Ratios of reported when one looks at the reported sex ratios in the 1980s alone. This is significant because the one child policy was implemented by the Chinese government in 1979 and in the 1980 we saw a rise the sex ratio especially among the children born outside of the plan which allows couples to have only two children. Thus, since we know from Figure 1 that the sex ratio between male and female children is usually around 105.5 males to 100 females, the statistics displayed in Figure 3 do not make sense. Theses female infants not being reported are missing. Many Chinese girls have been sold into prostitution rings, black market adoption or have been killed through infanticide. Figure 3