Diversifying youth temporal orientations during educational transitions in China

Abstract

Analysing young people's temporal experiences can help understand their varied transition pathways in individualised societies. This study explores the diversity of Chinese youths' orientations towards time by addressing how they practise agency, situated within the temporal, familial and gender matrices. We surveyed and interviewed young people at a county‐seat lower secondary school in North China and identified three temporal orientations: ‘long‐term planners’, ‘seizers of the day’ and ‘compromisers’. The findings challenge the conventional understanding of Chinese youth temporal orientations as homogeneous by identifying the differentiations and complexities when navigating their transition to upper secondary education.