Abstract
Millions of people swipe on dating apps and tap through their bank balances. These routine gestures are reshaping two consequential decisions: whom we partner with and who holds financial power within the household. This talk follows a single question from the dating profile to the bank account: Is digital technology reproducing or disrupting inequality within and between couples? It first presents a recently developed multilevel framework on the digitalization of family life, and then two studies of how digitalization reshapes inequality in who partners with whom and in who controls household money. These studies show that dating apps redraw partner choice in gender-asymmetric ways; online banking redistributes financial power between partners. Whom we match with determines what resources a household can pool; who manages those resources shapes how they are shared. Together, these studies lay the theoretical and empirical foundations for a new research agenda on digitalization and family inequalities.
About the Speaker
Yue Qian is a Professor of Sociology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research examines gender, family and work, and inequality in global contexts, with a particular focus on East Asia and North America. Her work tackles these topics against the backdrop of three prominent social changes of our time: digitalization, the rise of women in education, and the COVID-19 pandemic. She has published over 80 articles in top-tier journals, including Nature Human Behaviour, American Sociological Review, Social Forces, and Journal of Marriage and Family. Her research has been featured extensively in international media outlets (e.g., New York Times, The Washington Post, CBC, and South China Morning Post). Dr. Yue Qian’s contributions were recognized with the National Council on Family Relations’ Alexis Walker Award for path-breaking research in family science, Canadian Sociological Association’s Early Investigator Award, and International Chinese Sociological Association’s Yu Xie Early Career Award.
