Does Family Responsibility Affect Corporate ESG Performance? Evidence from Chinese Premarital Check-Up Rates

Family responsibility is a fundamental social concept that has a profound and long-lasting impact on people’s behavior, especially in China. Using the Chinese premarital check-up rate of the CEO’s birthplace as a proxy variable for the CEO’s sense of family responsibility, we examine its impact on firm environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance. Our results show that the CEO’s sense of family responsibility can significantly improve firm ESG performance. We identify three possible channels behind this effect: curbing corporate violations, promoting green transformation and increasing charitable investments. Further analysis shows that the effect is more pronounced for firms with a strong Confucian cultural atmosphere. However, the promotion effect becomes weaker when the CEO has overseas experience. Moreover, the improvement in ESG performance driven by family responsibility may help firms to increase total factor productivity. Overall, our study provides evidence on the impact of CEO’s family responsibility, an informal institution, on firm ESG performance