“Sharenting to define mothering”: A grounded theory study of middle-class mothers in urban China

Abstract

Sharenting, the practice of sharing parenting experiences on social media, has become a prevalent mothering practice across the world, including in China. This paper explored how Chinese mothers defined, constructed, and reconstructed their mothering through sharenting. Using a grounded theory approach, we conducted semistructured interviews with 23 urban middle-class mothers in China. Synthesis of the results revealed three distinct functions of sharenting that reflect a unique mixture of Western feminism and Chinese neo-familism: reinforcing mothering and motherhood, extending mothering through sharenting, and redefining mothering through sharenting. Furthermore, three discourses emerged: intensive motherhood, moral motherhood, and scientific motherhood. These findings provide vivid and nuanced evidence about the Chinese ways of shaping mothering through sharenting, deepening our understanding of sharenting as both empowering and oppressing the manifestation of mothering outside Western contexts.