Interethnic marriage is a relational phenomenon. It not only reflects individual marital choices but also forms a network of social ties among ethnic groups. Existing studies on interethnic marriage in China have mainly relied on intermarriage rates or regression models of marital choice. These approaches describe the level and determinants of interethnic marriage, but they do not fully reveal how the structure changes over time. An increase in the total volume of interethnic marriage may result either from more ethnic-group pairs becoming connected or from the accumulation of marriages within ties that have already existed. Distinguishing these two processes is essential for understanding the structural change of interethnic relations in China.

This study applies an intensity-connectivity framework to analyze changes in interethnic marriage. Drawing on Das Gupta's standardized decomposition method, it decomposes the total volume of intermarriage into two dimensions: intensity, defined as the average number of interethnic marriages per connected ethnic-group pair, and connectivity, defined as the proportion of connected ethnic-group pairs among all possible ethnic-group pairs. Based on interethnic marriage matrices for 56 ethnic groups from the 2000, 2010, and 2020 national population censuses, the study examines both aggregate network change and ethnic-group-level heterogeneity. Because the census data are stock rather than flow data, both measures describe accumulated relational structures rather than newly formed marriages.

The results show that China's interethnic marriage network underwent a structural change from breadth expansion to depth accumulation between 2000 and 2020. The total volume of interethnic marriage increased from 8.04 million in 2000 to 9.64 million in 2020, but the structural sources of this growth differed across periods. From 2000 to 2010, connectivity accounted for 93.8% of the increase, indicating that growth was driven primarily by the formation of marriage ties among previously unconnected ethnic groups. From 2010 to 2020, intensity contributed 120.9% of the increase, while the contribution of connectivity became negative. In this period, growth was driven by the accumulation of marriages within existing ties, whereas the decline in connectivity may reflect the disappearance of some weak or low-frequency ties. Accordingly, network connectivity followed an inverted U-shaped trajectory, rising from 2000 to 2010 and declining from 2010 to 2020.

At the ethnic-group level, changes in interethnic marriage were heterogeneous. The study identifies four types of structural change: depth accumulation, breadth expansion, simultaneous depth and breadth expansion, and marriage contraction. Most ethnic groups fall into the depth accumulation type, indicating that their growth in interethnic marriage mainly came from the deepening of existing ties. A small number of groups showed continued expansion in their relational scope, while others experienced both expansion and deepening. For a few groups with small populations and sparse ties, the loss of a few existing marriages may lead to contraction.

These findings show that changes in interethnic marriage cannot be adequately understood through intermarriage rates alone. The intensity-connectivity framework reveals the reorganization of the scope and accumulated depth of interethnic marriage ties, while the typology suggests that differing network positions should be fully considered when promoting interaction, communication, and integration among all ethnic groups in China.

With the deepening of China's population ageing, the prevalence of chronic diseases and disability among older adults is rising. How to delay the disability and improve the health status of the elderly has become social issues. Data from China's Seventh National Population Census show that in 2020, over 95% of older adults chose home-based elderly care. However, the existing residential buildings in China exhibit insufficient age-friendly home renovation due to outdated building standards and suboptimal spatial planning from earlier periods. To address this issue, China issued the Guiding Opinions on Accelerating the Implementation of Age-Friendly Home Renovation Projects for the Elderly, aiming to improve the quality and capacity of home-based elderly care services by promoting the age-friendly home renovation. However, whether it can effectively promote elderly health still requires further empirical verification.

Based on the data of China Longitudinal Aging Social Survey (CLASS) from 2018 to 2023, this study adopts the two-way fixed effect model to empirically examine the impact, potential mechanism, heterogeneity, and synergistic effect with smart devices of age-friendly home renovation on older adults' health. Grounded in the ICF framework, the study reveals the health-promoting pathways of age-friendly home renovation from physical, social, and psychological dimensions, and its synergistic effect with smart elderly care devices. This study provides practical references for promoting the construction of age-friendly home renovation, developing smart home-based elderly care services, and improving the building of age-friendly environments, thus possessing important theoretical and practical implications.

The findings indicate that age-friendly home renovation not only reduces the degree of disability among older adults but also alleviates the level of depressive symptoms. Mechanism analysis reveals that age-friendly home renovation promotes older adults' health by reducing the risk of falls and social isolation, as well as by promoting positive age identity. Heterogeneity analysis reveals stronger health-promoting effects among older adults aged 75 and above, those in empty-nest households, and those in rural areas. Moderation effect results show that smart devices positively moderate the relationship between age-friendly home renovation and older adults' health. Based on these findings, this study proposes policy recommendations including improving the quality and health benefits of age-friendly home renovation, implementing stratified and targeted renovation strategies, and advancing the deep integration of age-friendly home renovation with smart elderly care.

This study goes beyond previous policy evaluations that primarily focused on community public environments, shifting the unit of analysis to the home environment and examining the health effects of age-friendly home renovation from the perspective of physical and mental health, thereby addressing the limitations in existing research that has paid insufficient attention to the health impacts of family physical spaces. By constructing a systematic pathway across physical, social, and psychological environmental dimensions, this study extends age-friendly home renovation from the traditional “competence-press” fit model toward a new “resource-empowerment” perspective. Furthermore, by incorporating smart devices into the person-environment interaction framework, this study not only expands the analytical framework of person-tool-environment interaction within ecological theory of ageing but also enhances the explanatory power and application value of this theory in the context of smart elderly care.

The population ageing has pushed the older adults from the edge to the center of the consumption stage. Whether the pilot policies for smart elderly health care can promote the enjoyment-oriented consumption of the older adults has become an important issue. Based on the unbalanced panel data of the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) from 2014 to 2022, this paper explores the impact and mechanism of smart elderly health care on the enjoyment-oriented consumption of the older adults. The results reveal that smart elderly health care has significantly promoted the enjoyment-oriented consumption of the older adults. After a series of robustness tests, this conclusion still holds. Mechanism analysis shows that smart elderly health care increases the enjoyment-oriented consumption of the older adults by reducing medical expenses and decreasing precautionary savings. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that the promotion effect of smart elderly health care on the enjoyment-oriented consumption of the older adults is more significant in the eastern region, among internet users and highly educated people. Therefore, sustained policies for smart elderly health care are recommended.

The digital economy has a profound impact on employment. It provides more opportunities to low-skilled workers. Based on China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) data, this paper empirically analyzes the impact of digital economy on the career transition of low-skilled workers by employing a binary Logit model. The findings indicate that digital economy significantly increases the odds ratio of their career transition of low-skilled workers. Notably, low-skilled workers who are from agricultural households or located in the eastern and central regions experience a substantial boost in the career transition. The study identifies two key mechanisms driving this impact: employment effects and income effects. Moreover, low-skilled workers with higher level of capability or training experiences are more likely to transition to new careers due to the digital economy. Digital economy enhances the occupational reputation of low-skilled workers, and promotes their advancement into high and medium-low prestige occupations. Strengthening employment services, providing entrepreneurship policies, and offering skill trainings are recommended.

This article presents a matrix to analyze the ethnic identity of children from interethnic marriage families. Based on the population balance equation, this study uses individual level data from the seventh national population census to estimate the net effects of ethnic identity on the population change between 2010 and 2020 and examine the preferences among different ethnic groups. An increase of approximately 8.57 million children were from interethnic marriage families over the decade, with nearly 40% of the ethnic minority increase experiencing ethnic identity choices. The size of net population increase due to ethnic identity choices of the ethnic minority was about 1.95 million, accounting for about one-tenth of the increase in the ethnic minority population. For children from Han-minority intermarriage families, about 79.33% had ethnic minority identity. The population changes among different minority groups were mainly driven by the sizes and preferences of children from Han-minority intermarriage families. There were variations in interethnic preference among different interethnic marriage circles.

China is at the late stage of modernization with rapid population ageing, in which multigenerational relationship family network has become normal. Multigeneration relationship family network has a richer meaning than the tradition definition of family, and is also functionally important. Based on the social network analysis, six typical families are studied. It is found that the physical space and virtual space of family network are overlapped, and the spatial dispersion does not cause the psychological separation among family members. The multigenerational relationship of family demonstrates a variety of network types including complete solidarity, double axis solidarity, basic solidarity, partial solidarity, and differentiation. The content and direction of family intergenerational support are diversified. The flow direction and amount of different resource types are dissimilar, and the center of family relationship network and the connection mode among generations are also different. The reciprocity of family intergenerational relationship does not happen immediately, and the reciprocity would be more meaningful when it spans over individual life cycle and family life cycle.

Based on multiple survey data, the paper analyzes the situations and characteristics of family care arrangements for children aged 0~5 in China. Conducted by different organizations between 2010 2014, the multiple surveys show high childcare deficits, heavy burdens of mothers, imbalanced responsibility between motherhood and fatherhood, and a high proportion of childcare by grandparents. These problems not only directly affect the healthy growth of children, women??s employment and development, and the quality of family life, but also affect the implementation of the two-child policy. One of the key reasons of these problems is the lack of institutional support for childcare, particularly the shortage of formal care for children under age 3. “Work-family” balance has become a universal and rigid social needs. From a macro point of view, childcare is a necessary condition for population reproduction. From the perspective of family policy, it is necessary to extend the paternity leave and parental leave, to develop formal care agencies for children aged 0 ~ 3, and to promote the balance of workfamily for childcare givers.

This paper analyzes characteristics and patterns of the population with internal separation of registered and actual residences of Beijing in 2010 using the household registration data.The urban function extended districts and the new districts of urban development are the major places of residence for the population.While sex structure of the population is largely balanced,it is dominated by young and middle-aged people.Inter-district/county separation of registered and actual residences is the majority,with registered and actual residences typically being the neighboring districts.There are adverse consequences for household registration administration and community administration resulting from the increasing population separated from their registered places.Special efforts are needed to collect information of population in actual residences on a regular basis.The paper concludes with discussion on policy suggestions dealing with the problem.