Fertility among ethnic groups in the USSR

Abstract

Thirty-six ethnie groups in the USSR are analyzed as to fertility differentials. The analysis is based on data from the 1959 nationwide census. To explain the fertility differentials found, ethnographic and sociological features of these groups are traced as a possible contributing factor. One of the poignant observations of the study is the fact that almost all ethnic groups with fertility above the median are those belonging to Moslem and Buddhist traditions. They are primarily located in the Central Asian republics, the Caucasus, and some parts of southern Siberia. Low fertility levels are by and large associated with the Eastern Orthodox Slavs and the Protestant Balts.Ratios of the number of children aged 0-9 to the number of women in the 20-49 age group are related to independent variables in the following order of importance: traditional religion, percentage of married women in the 20-49 age group, degree of literacy, male-female literacy differential, and sex ratio. The multiple correlation of 0.911 was obtained between the child-woman ratio and the first four of the most important independent variables. Sex ratio appeared significant only after the influence of the percentage of married women was eliminated from the analysis of multiple and partial correlations.The data suggest that the urban-rural differential is a non-linear function of the urban-rural migration. A more complete explanation of the divergence between urban and rural child-woman fertility ratios should be made the subject of separate studies.