Rural-to-urban Migration and Rising Evaluation Standards for Subjective Social Status in Contemporary China

People’s evaluation standards in rating social status may evolve when exterior living circumstances change, and studying whether and how migration process changes individuals’ evaluation standards in rating social status can shed new light on this issue. Utilizing the dataset from 2010–2012 China Family Panel Studies and by employing the anchoring vignette method, this study reveals for the first time that rural-to-urban migrants adopt higher standards than those who stay behind in the countryside, but their evaluation standards still remain significantly lower than those adopted by urban residents. Heterogeneity in transitions of reference points within the migrants group is also explored. Except for the eldest cohort, all other younger migrants employ significantly higher standards in rating social status than rural villagers; the new generation of migrants is not significantly different from the elder in terms of the evaluation standards. More importantly, the increase in evaluation standards of migrants becomes greater through the years, from the moment of departure from one’s hukou registration place. These findings challenge the prevalent practice of assigning or assuming an ad hoc reference group to migrants in many studies, and advance our understanding on the determinants of the reference points used to evaluate social status, on which little is known so far.