For many young, unmarried Chinese people, the weeklong Spring Festival, the holiday also known as Chinese New Year, is a difficult time because they are bombarded with questions about marriage by nagging parents and relatives.

I had a hard time finding the right partner until I was 30, but my parents did not push me too hard. This might be because they were well-educated and open-minded, and also because I didn't grow up with them. Therefore, the community my parents lived in did not really know me. I only recently realized that the second reason was more important than the first.

I was raised by my grandmother at her home until I graduated from high school. A few years ago, when I was walking on a street in Vancouver, I heard someone calling out to me using my childhood nickname. It turned out to be one of my grandmother's neighbors. After a short greeting, she inquired after my child, who she assumed was already in university. This shocked me because my child was not even in primary school yet.

The truth slowly emerged during our conversation. About 20 years ago, when I was still single – but most of my classmates had already had children–my grandmother concocted a story about a marriage and grandchild.

Parents press their children to get married, partly because of the pressure from their community. To get married or not – this seems to be a perennial source of conflict between parents and children. However, it is actually a reflection of the conflict between the interests of an individual and society.

In a society that puts a lot of weight on traditions and relationships, gossip is a weapon used to bring rule breakers back in line. Parents and children clash because they have different levels of tolerance when it comes to handling gossip.

When I was young, I could always ignore the neighborhood gossip. But after that chance encounter with my grandmother's neighbor in Vancouver, I felt sad and guilty because I realized I underestimated the social pressure that my grandmother suffered long ago. After failing to persuade me to get married, she resorted to fabricating a story when prodded by inquisitive neighbors. I can only imagine the pain and sense of loss she felt.

As societies develop, individuals enjoy greater freedom and community ties wither away. Young people can choose to leave their homes, and this pushes the older generation to readjust to living in an empty nest, contrary to a tradition that says multiple generations should live under one roof. This turns the annual family gathering during the Spring Festival into a battleground, when parents clash with children on issues like marriage.

I once read an article published in a South Korean newspaper that said that each year parents in Korea usually started to worry about their children's marriage in July because they hoped their children would tie the knot in autumn or winter, a tradition inherited from the past. The article said that this phenomenon can also be seen in China.

Nagging children about marriage has become a part of family gatherings during Spring Festival. Parents become emotional and start talking about it whenever they see a neighbor playing with a grandchild.

To avoid such conflicts, young people could take their parents out of their hometowns to spend the holiday so that they can avoid bumping into curious neighbors or visit their parents more often so that they have more time to discuss important issues like marriage without letting the pressure build up over time.

All of this reminds me of an episode from my favorite TV sitcom, Frasier, in which a Jewish woman arranges a blind date for her daughter just before Christmas. It seems pressing children to think about settling down during the holidays is a tradition among people from different cultures.

Wang Yuan is a novelist. She is the author of the novels Everything Costs and If You Can Choose Your Life