Situating Chinese American husbands’ traditional gender beliefs within acculturative and marital processes.

OBJECTIVE: Confucian beliefs emphasize the role of husbands as financial providers and authority figures, whereas wives are tasked with managing household matters. Such beliefs in men may have negative effects on their partners within heterosexual couples. However, these concepts have rarely been examined with Chinese American families. The present study situated Chinese American husbands' traditional gender beliefs within paths from their cultural orientations to their wives' outcomes. METHOD: Among 416 Chinese American married couples and across three waves of data, path analyses examined indirect paths from husbands' cultural orientations (Wave 1) to the outcomes of wives (Wave 3), sequentially through husbands' traditional gender beliefs (Wave 2) and husbands' marital behaviors (Wave 2). RESULTS: Greater husbands' Chinese cultural orientation (Wave 1) indirectly predicted both lower wives' expressions of the husband mattering and greater wives' depressive symptoms (Wave 3), sequentially through higher husbands' traditional gender beliefs and lower husbands' marital warmth (Wave 2). Neither wives' own traditional gender beliefs nor family economic stress (Wave 2) significantly moderated effects from husbands' traditional gender beliefs or marital behaviors (Wave 2) to wives' outcomes (Wave 3). CONCLUSION: Husbands' traditional gender beliefs are a significant factor linking their cultural experiences to the behavioral and adjustment outcomes of their spouses. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).