Changes In Fertility Behavior Research Articles

Repercussions of the Recent Economic Downturn on Birth Rates in Greece

A comprehensive analysis of historical economic recessions in developed nations confirms the significant impact of social and economic crises on fertility rates. Across different countries, these effects exhibit common characteristics, such as a modest influence on overall fertility rates, delays in the timing of first childbirth linked to later marriages or unions, and a correlation between unemployment and age-specific fertility. Countries with established family policies and robust social security systems tend to experience less pronounced changes in fertility behavior during economic crises. The recent economic downturn in Greece unfolded amidst unique social conditions, including increased female labor force participation, widespread use of reliable contraception allowing for delayed childbearing, and escalating social security and healthcare costs due to an aging population. These factors may influence reproductive decisions and exacerbate the adverse effects of the recession on fertility rates. This study utilizes the latest official data from Greece to examine the impact of the current economic crisis on fertility levels and their evolution over time.

Reproductive Burden and Its Impact on Female Labor Market Outcomes in India: Evidence from Longitudinal Analyses

We use nationally representative data from two waves of the Indian Human Development Survey to examine the role of inter-temporal changes in fertility behavior in influencing female labor market outcomes. Our multivariate regression estimates show that an increase in the number of children reduces labor force participation and earnings. We further investigated the impact of fertility changes on transitions from the labor market. The results show that women who had more than three children in both rounds of the survey had a 3.5% points higher probability of exiting from the labor market than their counterparts with two or fewer children net of other socio-demographic factors. Disaggregated analyses by caste, economic, educational status, and region show that the probability of dropping out of the labor market due to fertility changes varies by region and is greater for non-poor and primary to secondary schooling women and those from socially disadvantaged castes than poor, non-educated, and socially advantageous women.

Gender Role Attitudes and Parents’ Intention to Continue Childbearing in Turkey

It is increasingly acknowledged that gender (in-) equality is one of the most significant factors underlying change in fertility behavior. Researchers have extensively studied the link between gender (in-) equality and fertility decision-making in various settings. However, most of these studies have focused on industrialized countries in North America, Europe, and East Asia, while very few examine this relationship in a non-western, developing country context. Employing individual-level survey data, this paper examines the relationship between parents’ gender role attitudes and their fertility intentions for an additional child in urban Turkey, surveyed in 2014. The findings of this study show that parents’ attitudes toward gender roles were not an important predictor of fertility decision-making in Turkey. This study suggests that the lack of significant findings supporting the expected association may be related to the measurement of gender role attitudes, suggesting a need to construct a measure that addresses culture-specific aspects of gender roles. This study contributes to the literature by providing a new data point, Turkey, and bringing a comparative perspective to the existing research.

Reproductive burden and its impact on female labor market outcomes in India: Evidence from longitudinal analyses

We use nationally representative data from two waves of the Indian Human Development Survey to provide causal evidence on the role of inter-temporal changes in fertility behaviour in influencing female labor market outcomes. Our multivariate regression estimates show that an increase in the number of children reduces labor force participation and earnings. We further investigated the impact of fertility changes on transitions from the labor market. The results show that women who had more than three children in both rounds of the survey had a 3.5 percentage points higher probability of exiting from the labor market. Disaggregated analyses by caste, economic status and region show regional heterogeneity, and the probability of dropping-out of the labor market due to fertility changes is greater for non-poor women and those from socially disadvantaged castes.

Can a cash transfer to families change fertility behaviour?

Objective: This paper assesses the much-disputed relationship between family policy and fertility, and cash transfers and fertility in particular. Methods: We take advantage of a cash-for-care (CFC) policy introduced in Norway in 1998, and compare the subsequent fertility behaviour of eligible and ineligible mothers over a four-year period. We estimate linear models assessing both the occurrence and timing of second births, relying on a rich set of covariates and a sensitivity analysis to ensure the robustness of our results. Results: Contrary to theoretical expectations, the results show that CFC-eligible mothers had a slower progression to second births and lower short-term fertility. The patterns differ between different groups of mothers, and the decline in subsequent childbearing is only statistically significant among mothers with upper secondary (but not higher) education and part-time or full-time employment. We find no increase in short-term fertility in any group of mothers, and suggest that this pattern may be driven by an interaction between the CFC benefit and the already established Norwegian parental leave scheme. Contribution: The paper demonstrates how policy changes may indeed be associated with changes in fertility behaviour, and that this association may run in theoretically unexpected directions when a given policy is implemented in a wider policy framework. Moreover, it demonstrates how eligible parents may differ in their response to policies depending on the policy’s income effect and the parents’ opportunity costs of childbearing.

Women’s age at last childbearing and its determinants: a case study of Antwerp (Flanders, Belgium) on the basis of the multi-source COR* historical sample

Declines in the age at last childbearing in the first demographic transition reflected conscious changes in fertility behaviour during that period, in particular efforts to limit the total number of children. Such fertility limitation behaviour was the net result of ‘cultural causal factors’ on the one hand and ‘structural and economic causal factors’ on the other hand. This paper analyses the evolution of women’s age at last childbearing by reconstructing women’s life histories based on data from the multi-source COR* historical sample for Antwerp in the period 1846–1920. The paper also assesses the causes of this evolution through a number of theoretically grounded structural/economic, cultural and life course determinants, placing these concepts in a macro-micro framework of methodological individualism. For this purpose, in the first place a Kaplan-Meier analysis is applied to 10-year birth cohorts; a proportional hazard model is also applied to three different birth cohorts (mothers born before 1840; born in the period 1840–1859; and born after 1860); and a range of cultural and life course determinants are analysed, including women’s literacy status, marriage witness characteristics, the seasonality of marriages and births, and birth histories. The analysis confirms the decline in the age at last childbearing especially in the late cohort, and also highlights inter-cohort differences caused by cultural and life course determinants.

Human Fertility Behavior Through Birth Interval Models: Overview

Fertility is one of the responsible factors for the growth of human population. The demographers have given priority to understanding of the determinants of fertility through statistical techniques. Analytical models are suitable and appropriate tools and are widely used for better understanding of the phenomenon of the human fertility behavior. In other words, these models are useful in describing the action and interaction among various factors as well as for predicting the change in fertility behavior. The analytic models play an important role in estimation and interpretation of the fertility behaviors. In this paper, discuss the of birth intervals model based on realistic assumptions of human reproductive process, indirectly incorporating socio-cultural, bio-demographic factors, taboos and also use of contraceptive practices. In these derived models to describe the variation in the length of closed, forward, straddling and open birth interval with the realistic assumption that all the females are not exposed to the risk of conception immediately after the termination of post-partum amenorrhea (PPA) due to some factors or contraceptive practices. In these models, fecundability (λ) has been considered to be constant over the study period. The duration of time from the point of termination of PPA to the state of exposure has been taken as random variable which follows exponential distribution. The maximum likelihood estimation technique has been used for the estimation of parameter (λ) through different derived models.

Probability Model of Forward Birth Interval and Its Application

In renewal theory approach, it is well known that the limiting forms of the probability density function of backward recurrence time and forward recurrence time which are similar to open birth interval and forward birth interval are identical on the assumption that the renewal densities do not change over time. The forward birth interval defined as the time between the survey date and the date of next birth posterior to the survey date. Forward birth interval is a good index for current change in fertility behavior. The present model has been derived on the assumption that females are not exposed to the risk of conception immediately after the termination of Post-Partum Amenorrhea (PPA). However they may be exposed to the risk of conception at different point of time after the termination of PPA because of some socio-cultural factors or contraceptive practices. In this probability model for forward birth interval regardless of parity assuming that renewal density does not change over time and females are exposed to the risk of conception at different point of time. In this model, fecundability (λ) and the duration of time from the point of termination of PPA to the state of exposure as random variable (µ) which follows exponential distribution. The maximum likelihood estimation technique has been used for the estimation of parameters λ and µ through derived model. The estimated values of λ and µ are 1.1051 and 2.841 respectively. The variance of estimated λ and µ are 0.067 and 0.79 respectively. The co-variance in between estimated λ and µ is -0.026.With these estimates the expected frequencies for the distribution and χ2 = 0.6057 is highly significant. Thus, the derived probability model explains the fertility behavior of observed data satisfactorily well.

Do Changes in Condom Availability Affect Short-Term Fertility? Evidence from Rwanda

This paper examines the increase in condom supply resulting from the DELIVER project's activity in Rwanda. In particular, I examine whether increases in the availability of condoms affected short-term fertility for women in Rwanda or generated changes in the distribution of births among mothers of certain characteristics. Using Measure DHS survey data, I exploit location-specific variation in the change in condom supply between 2000 and 2005 using a difference-in-differences framework. Via probit methodology, I find some evidence that increases in condom availability reduced short-term fertility and reallocated births, with a higher percentage of births accruing to women with some secondary education. However, closer examination of the data suggests that these results may be driven by increases in stimuli to demand for contraceptives rather than by increases in condom supply. On one hand, this is consistent with the generally accepted argument in development economics today that fertility outcomes are determined more so by demand-side factors than by access to contraceptives. On the other hand, my findings refute a more staunch version of this hypothesis, as they suggest that either increases in condom supply, increases in exposure to family planning advertisements in the media, or a combination of both, yielded changes in fertility behavior.

Fertility Decline in Rural China: A Comparative Analysis

Many models have been proposed to explain both the rapidity of China's fertility decline after the 1960s and the differential timing of the decline in different places. In particular, scholars argue over whether deliberate policies of fertility control, institutional changes, or general modernization factors contribute most to changes in fertility behavior. Here the authors adopt an ethnographically grounded behavioral-institutional approach to analyze qualitative and quantitative data from three different rural settings: Xiaoshan County in Zhejiang (East China), Ci County in Hebei, (North China), and Yingde County in Guangdong (South China). The authors show that no one set of factors explain differential timing by a combination of differences in social-cultural environments (e.g. spread of education, reproductive ideologies, and gender relations) and politico-economic conditions (e.g. economic development, birth planning campaigns, and collective systems of labor organization) during the early phases of the fertility decline.

Spatial and temporal changes in fertility behavior of Indian women cohots.

This study investigates spatial and temporal changes in the fertility behavior of cohorts of Indian women. Data from all three National Family Health Surveys have been used in this study. A six parameter Gompertz model has been proposed and made use of for quantification of the fertility behavior of the cohorts of Indian women. Findings include (1) drop expected in Cohort Total Fertility Rate (CTFR) was the highest in North-east India ( from 5.80 to 3.08) and the lowest in Central India (from 6.34 to 4.76) among the cohorts of women who ended their reproductive period in 1993 and those who will end their reproductive period in 2025. (2) Assuming that any changes in the CTFR are linear across cohorts until it reaches the replacement level fertility of 2.1 the study found that only those cohorts of women in the South India who will end their reproductive period after 2024 will end up with replacement level fertility. The corresponding year of achieving replacement level fertility for the women in West North-east North East and the Central India are expected to be 2031 2037 2044 2047 and 2079 respectively. However the year of achieving replacement level fertility in Central East and the North India can be brought down by improving the quality of family planning services in these regions.

Demographic transitions: analyzing the effects of mortality on fertility

The effect of mortality reductions on fertility is one of the main mechanisms stressed by the recent growth literature in order to explain demographic transitions. We analyze the empirical relevance of this mechanism based on the experience of developed and developing countries since 1960. We distinguish between the effects on gross and net fertility, take into account the dynamic nature of the relationship, and control for alternative explanatory factors and for endogeneity. Our results show that mortality plays a large role in fertility reductions, that the change in fertility behavior comes with a lag of about 10 years and that both net and gross fertility are affected. We find comparatively little support for explanations of the demographic transition based on changes in GDP per capita.

Vanishing Children: From High Unemployment to Low Fertility in Developed Countries.

During the last four decades the average total fertility rate in OECD countries witnessed a dramatic fall: from 2.9 in 1960 to 2.0 in 1975 and then to 1.6 in the late 1990s (reaching 1.25 in Southern Europe). With the exception of the United States, all advanced countries now have fertility rates well below the replacement rate of 2.1. In the absence of either sharp changes in fertility behavior or large inflows of immigrants, their populations are set to shrink, particularly in Europe. Still, within this generalized fall, cross-national differences in fertility behavior have remained significant. By 2000, fertility rates ranged from 2.1 in the United States and over 1.8 in France and Norway to less than 1.3 in Greece, Italy, and Spain. Most standard accounts attribute the fall in fertility rates to a shift in personal preferences over the size of the family due to either changes in religious beliefs or growing female participation in the labor market. Yet, even though the ideal number of children for men and women 20–34 years old has declined, it is fairly similar across the European Union at around the replacement level of 2.1 (Eurostat, 2001). Hence, the sources of cross-national variation in fertility behavior must lie somewhere else. As women have joined the labor force, fertility rates have adjusted as a function of the institutional structures that shape the job market and determine its long-run unemployment rate. Exploiting the considerable variation of fertility rates and employment conditions across industrial countries, this paper shows that the current demographic transition is ultimately associated with the constraints of the labor market where fertility decisions are taken.

Does Parental Leave Affect Fertility and Return-to-Work? Evidence from a True Natural Experiment

We study the causal effects of changes in parental leave provisions on fertility and return-to-work behavior. We exploit a policy change that took place in 1990 in Austria which extended the maximum duration of parental leave from the child's first to the child's second birthday. As parental leave benefits can be automatically renewed when a new mother is still on leave from a previous child, this created a strong incentive to bunch the time off work in case of multiple planned children and/or to increase fertility. We study the quantitative effect of this incentive using an empirical strategy which resembles a true experimental set-up very closely. In particular, assignment to treatment is random and treated and controls face (almost) identical environmental conditions. We find that treated mothers have a 4.9 percentage points (or 15 percent) higher probability to get an additional child within the following three years; and a 3.9 percentage points higher probability in the following ten years. This suggests that not only the timing but also the number of children were affected by the policy change. We also find that parental leave rules have a strong effect on mothers' return-to-work behavior. Per additional months of maximum parental leave duration, mothers' time off work is reduced by 0.4 to 0.5 months. The effects of a subsequent policy change in 1996 when maximum parental leave duration was reduced from the child’s second birthday to the date when the child became 18 months old brought about no change in fertility behavior, but a labor supply effect that is comparable in magnitude to the one generated by the 1990 policy change. This can be rationalized by the incentives created through automatic benefit renewal.

Timing of First Births in East Germany after Reunification

<bold>Abstract</bold> When German reunification was accompanied by a rapid decline in aggregate fertility rates, researchers particularly assigned high unemployment rates a dominant role for changes in fertility behavior. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, we investigate changes in the timing of first birth in East Germany after reunification. Using data from the GSOEP, we show that even after reunification East Germans are younger at first birth than their West German counterparts. Second, we investigate the relationship between male and female unemployment and first birth risks. A major result is that female unemployment fosters the transition into parenthood in East Germany.

Fertility decline in a US population favoring large families: A hazard-model analysis of the effect of sib death on Amish fertility

This paper uses proportional hazards techniques and population data from a directory of the Old Order Amish of the Lancaster, PA settlement. It examines the effect of death of the immediately prior sibling on the risk of childbearing for up to 11 children. Prior research typically has pooled data for maternal cohorts. In contrast, separate models are estimated for each maternal cohort. The results are based on all reported first marriages of Amish women born between 1884–1973 (N = 4066). Hazard models run separately for children of each birth order reveal that net of maternal age and length of the prior birth interval (and other statistical and design controls), the death of the prior sib significantly increases the risk of a subsequent birth for the lower birth orders. Separate models by maternal cohort show that sib death increases the risk primarily for later cohorts. The pattern of effects from child mortality and other variables suggests changes in fertility behavior among the Amish, who have strong, traditional norms opposing contraception and favoring large families.

Twentieth-Century Family Life Cycle and Its Determinants in the United States

Fertility schedules, one of the most important vital statistics, are used to construct a new period and cohort time series macrolevel data set of family life cycle/ childbearing and fertility-inhibiting indices for the United States in the twentieth century. Calculation of these macrolevel indices on an annual basis is accom plished by the application of recent demographic methodologies, which require only knowledge of age-specific fertility rates. These annual sets of indices, which otherwise would require detailed biographical information on the dates of such events, are needed to fully capture demographic change and to quantitatively ascertain changes in fertility behavior and attitudes and, hence, describe family structure and the timing and speed of child production for better understanding of American society.

Cohort fertility changes and period fertility in 1960-1990 in Finland

In Finland, like in most European countries, the total fertility rate declined from a level of 2.5 births per woman in the middle of the 1960s below the replacement level of 2.1 births during the late sixties. This change has been called Europe’s second demographic transition. This paper aims to describe the changes in cohort fertility during and after this transition. The cohorts whose fertility is examined include the cohorts of women bom between 1923-24 and 1961-62. The cohort fertility data are from unpublished tables of Statistics Finland. Total fertility decreased from 2.6 births per woman in the cohort 1923-24 to the level of 1.8-1.9 births per woman in the cohorts 1943-44 and has stayed at this level in younger cohorts. The most prominent change in fertility behavior in recent years has been delaying births later in life. This transformation has been going on since the cohorts born in the middle of the 1940s. In calendar time this transformation started in the late sixties which suggests that the new contraception methods played an important role in it. Cohort fertility results are used in interpreting period fertility trends and variability in the last decades.

Development policy and the African demographic transition: issues and questions.

"This paper gives an overview of the recent demographic history of countries in sub-Saharan Africa, especially the start of a fertility decline. After discussing the evidence for a decline, and the nature of changes in fertility behaviour, the paper moves on to look at possible causes, in relation to development policy. Mortality, cultural structure, the status of women, education and economic crisis are all considered as candidates. The conclusion is reached that available evidence raises as many questions about the causes of fertility decline as it resolves, particularly in our understanding of the process of change. Finally, the potential consequences of falls in fertility and population growth slowdown in sub-Saharan Africa are considered."

The determinants of early fertility decline in Texas

This study examines the determinants of fertility control in a frontier population made up largely of German-Americans during the years from 1850 to 1910. The analysis employs a complex register of population constructed from census enumerations, civil and ecclesiastical vital registration, and tax assessment rolls. The article begins with a series of bivariate analyses with cohort of mother's birth, religion, ethnicity, and husband's occupation determining marital fertility. The second half of the paper presents a multivariate model of the determinants of fertility using these and other demographic characteristics as independent variables. The conclusions emphasize the importance of the overall trend toward fertility decline in the United States, as well as the role of religion and of occupational differences, in determining changes in fertility behavior in the population of Gillespie County, Texas.