Community Resources

International Day of the Girl Child • October 11

Son Preference

A tradition that puts a boy first for luck is a small version of a much bigger pattern. Around the world, being born a girl still changes what a family invests, what a child inherits, and who gets counted.

142M
girls missing worldwide from son preference and gender-biased sex selection. Source: UNFPA.
112:100
boys born per 100 girls in China as of the 2021 census, down from a peak of 121 in 2005 but still above the natural rate of about 105:100. Source: China National Bureau of Statistics, 2021 census.
Nearly 2x
what parents in one major study spent on sons versus daughters for education and marriage combined. Source: Asian Development Bank Institute.
2012
the year International Day of the Girl Child was first observed, established by UN Resolution 66/170.

What Son Preference Actually Looks Like

Not one law, one country, or one family. A pattern that shows up in dozens of different forms

Sex-Selective Abortion Patrilineal Inheritance “Carrying The Name” Dowry Pressure Old-Age Support Expectations Unequal Investment First-Footing Superstition Missing Girls Birth-Order Bias Marriage “Cutting Off” A Daughter Primogeniture Unequal Education Spending

Why We Are Talking About This

My son has to come in before I can walk in, because I won’t bring good luck. I didn’t appreciate that.

I grew up hearing it, and I still hear it now. On New Year’s, I’m not supposed to be the first person through the door. A man is supposed to go first, because a man walking in first is what brings a house good luck for the year. In my own family, that means my son.

My son has to come in before I can walk in, because I won’t bring good luck.

That never made sense to me the first time I heard it, and it still doesn’t. I never asked anyone where it came from. It was just what we did.

This isn’t only about one holiday. A superstition about who walks through a door first is a small version of a much bigger pattern, one that shows up in who a family invests in, who inherits, and whose name a household is expected to carry forward.

Understand The Pattern

Son Preference: What It Involves

What is son preference?

A documented, global preference for male children over female children, showing up as unequal investment, unequal inheritance, and in its most severe form, sex-selective abortion and the neglect or abandonment of girls. Demographers track it through the sex ratio at birth, boys born per 100 girls. The natural rate everywhere is close to 105:100. Anything meaningfully higher signals intervention, not biology.

Where does this show up today?

Both China and India are improving, and both are still off the natural rate. China’s sex ratio at birth peaked at 121 boys per 100 girls in 2005, and had come down to 112 by the 2021 census, still elevated, not yet normal. India moved from 111 in the 2011 census to 108 in the 2019-2021 National Family Health Survey. The natural rate everywhere is close to 105:100. Neither country is there yet. Sources: China National Bureau of Statistics; Pew Research Center analysis of NFHS data, 2022.

Where did valuing sons over daughters start?

Further back than any single culture. The Code of Hammurabi, one of the oldest written legal codes, states the reasoning directly: daughters “marry strangers and thereby cut themselves off from their family,” while sons inherit because they “perpetuate the family name, and preserve the ancestral property.” Property and lineage got tied to sons thousands of years ago, and a lot of what still gets called tradition is that same logic, still running.

Why did old-age support get tied to sons?

In cultures shaped by Confucian filial duty, sons were expected to financially support aging parents while daughters were expected to leave the family at marriage. One study of rural Chinese families found parents invested nearly twice as much in sons as daughters across education and marriage costs combined. The same study found something that logic doesn’t predict: daughters who no longer lived with their parents still gave 11 to 24% more financial and in-kind support than sons did. Source: Asian Development Bank Institute.

Where did “let the man go first for luck” come from?

Traced to first-footing, a Scottish New Year custom where the first person through the door after midnight was believed to set the household’s luck for the year. The preference for a dark-haired man traces to Viking-era Scotland, where a fair-haired stranger at the door could mean a raid was starting, not a blessing. The custom outlived the actual danger by centuries and kept getting passed down as a belief about who brings good fortune, long after anyone remembered why. Source: Historic UK.

What is International Day of the Girl Child?

Established by UN General Assembly Resolution 66/170 on December 19, 2011, designating October 11 every year. First observed October 11, 2012, themed Ending Child Marriage. It traces to Plan International’s Because I Am a Girl campaign, brought to the UN by Canada and championed by their Minister for the Status of Women, with a delegation of women and girls presenting the case directly to the UN Commission on the Status of Women.

Where To Go From Here

If this is the first time you’re seeing the actual numbers, here’s who’s working on it.

These organizations research gender-biased sex selection, fund girls’ education, and run the campaign behind October 11.

Primary Resource

Plan International, Because I Am a Girl

The campaign that brought International Day of the Girl Child to the UN, still running programs on girls’ education and rights worldwide.

plan-international.org

Global Data

UNFPA, Son Preference

The UN agency tracking gender-biased sex selection worldwide, including the 142 million figure cited on this page.

unfpa.org/son-preference

Child Marriage & Dowry

Girls Not Brides

A global partnership of organizations working to end child marriage, one of the practices tied directly to son preference and dowry economics.

girlsnotbrides.org

The Official Day

UN Women

The UN entity coordinating International Day of the Girl Child programming and reporting on girls’ rights worldwide.

unwomen.org

You Don’t Need A Study To Notice This In Your Own Family.

Most of this doesn’t announce itself as son preference. It shows up as a tradition, a joke, an assumption about who gets asked first.

  • Ask where a family tradition came from before passing it to the next generation
  • Notice which child gets asked their opinion first, and which one gets told to go along
  • Name it out loud when investment or attention splits unevenly between siblings by gender
  • Support organizations funding girls’ education directly, the most researched lever against son preference
  • If a tradition puts a male first “for luck,” ask who decided that and whether it’s ever been questioned
  • Teach a daughter she doesn’t have to be exceptional to be worth what a son is worth by default
  • Share October 11 with someone who has never heard of it

This page is for education and awareness. Figures are sourced to UNFPA, the China National Bureau of Statistics, Pew Research Center, the Asian Development Bank Institute, Historic UK, and the United Nations as cited. It does not represent the practices or beliefs of any single culture, family, or individual mentioned.