Ex-nuptially Conceived Births: a Note on Measurement

Abstract

This report explores possible measures of exnuptial fertility that will control for changes in population size and composition but introduce no new extraneous variables. A measure is selected which expresses exnuptial fertility as a rate/1000 unmarried women by age. However data on numbers of unmarried women by age are only available for census years and it is assumed that all unmarried women are sexually active and at risk of pregnancy. Australian census data is presented on numbers of unmarried (never married widowed and divorced) women aged 15-44 on exnuptial confinements and bridal confinements (confinements within the first 7 months of marriage) by age of mother and on exnuptial and bridal births as a rate/1000 unmarried women by age. From the raw data it is evident that: 1) the numbers of girls aged 15-19 are far more numerous than older age categories and 2) exnuptial and bridal fertility of teenagers is higher than for other age categories but there has been a continuing decline throughout the 1970s in exnuptially conceived births to teenage mothers. Conversion of the raw data into the rate/1000 unmarried women shows that actually teenagers have very low exnuptial birth rates lower than all other age groups except the 40-44 group. Furthermore although the exnuptial and bridal birth rates rose during the 1960s all rates for all age groups fell sharply during the early 70s. The data reveals differences in the distribution of exnuptial and bridal births by age. Unmarried women over 25 years of age tend to have exnuptial births while younger women tend to legitimize exnuptial pregnancies by marriage. Explanations suggested for the differential decline in the exnuptial and bridal fertility rates include increasing social acceptance of single motherhood stability of relationships the structure of availability of birth control and variations in family planning resources with social class.