Family planner
Short- and long-term effects of unemployment on fertility
Janet Currie & Hannes Schwandt
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 14 October 2014, Pages 14734–14739
Abstract:
Scholars have been examining the relationship between fertility and unemployment for more than a century. Most studies find that fertility falls with unemployment in the short run, but it is not known whether these negative effects persist, because women simply may postpone childbearing to better economic times. Using more than 140 million US birth records for the period 1975–2010, we analyze both the short- and long-run effects of unemployment on fertility. We follow fixed cohorts of US-born women defined by their own state and year of birth, and relate their fertility to the unemployment rate experienced by each cohort at different ages. We focus on conceptions that result in a live birth. We find that women in their early 20s are most affected by high unemployment rates in the short run and that the negative effects on fertility grow over time. A one percentage point increase in the average unemployment rate experienced between the ages of 20 and 24 reduces the short-run fertility of women in this age range by six conceptions per 1,000 women. When we follow these women to age 40, we find that a one percentage point increase in the unemployment rate experienced at ages 20–24 leads to an overall loss of 14.2 conceptions. This long-run effect is driven largely by women who remain childless and thus do not have either first births or higher-order births.
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Sex differences in the relationship between status and number of offspring in the contemporary U.S.
Rosemary Hopcroft
Evolution and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
Sociobiology predicts that among social species individual social status will be positively correlated with reproductive success, yet in modern societies the opposite appears to be true. However, in the last five to ten years, a sex difference in the association between some measures of personal status on number of children has been documented in many countries, such that status is positively associated with number of children for men only. Much of this research utilizes European data and there has been little use of data from the U.S. In this paper, analysis of U.S. data from the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth shows that personal income is positively associated with number of offspring for men, and this is true for men at all levels of education. This is mostly because of increased childlessness among low income men. For women, personal income is negatively associated with number of offspring, and this is true for women at all levels of education. Other measures of status (intelligence and education) are negatively associated with number of offspring for men and women, although the negative association is less for men.
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Fertility Transitions Along the Extensive and Intensive Margins
Daniel Aaronson, Fabian Lange & Bhashkar Mazumder
American Economic Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
By allowing for an extensive margin in the standard quantity-quality model, we generate new insights into fertility transitions. We test the model on Southern black women affected by a large-scale school construction program. Consistent with our model, women facing improved schooling opportunities for their children were more likely to have at least one child but chose to have smaller families overall. By contrast, women who themselves obtained more schooling due to the program delayed childbearing along both the extensive and intensive margins and entered higher quality occupations, consistent with education raising opportunity costs of child rearing.
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Childbearing Postponement and Child Well-being: A Complex and Varied Relationship?
Alice Goisis & Wendy Sigle-Rushton
Demography, October 2014, Pages 1821-1841
Abstract:
Over the past several decades, U.S. fertility has followed a trend toward the postponement of motherhood. The socioeconomic causes and consequences of this trend have been the focus of attention in the demographic literature. Given the socioeconomic advantages of those who postpone having children, some authors have argued that the disadvantage experienced by certain groups would be reduced if they postponed their births. The weathering hypothesis literature, by integrating a biosocial perspective, complicates this argument and posits that the costs and benefits of postponement may vary systematically across population subgroups. In particular, the literature on the weathering hypothesis argues that, as a consequence of their unique experiences of racism and disadvantage, African American women may experience a more rapid deterioration of their health which could offset or eventually reverse any socioeconomic benefit of postponement. But because very few African American women postpone motherhood, efforts to find compelling evidence to support the arguments of this perspective rely on a strategy of comparison that is problematic because a potentially selected group of older black mothers are used to represent the costs of postponement. This might explain why the weathering hypothesis has played a rather limited role in the way demographers conceptualize postponement and its consequences for well-being. In order to explore the potential utility of this perspective, we turn our attention to the UK context. Because first-birth fertility schedules are similar for black and white women, we can observe (rather than assume) whether the meaning and consequences of postponement vary across these population subgroups. The results, obtained using linked UK census and birth record data, reveal evidence consistent with the weathering hypothesis in the United Kingdom and lend support to the arguments that the demographic literature would benefit from integrating insights from this biosocial perspective.
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Paternal age predicts offspring chances of marriage and reproduction
Martin Fieder & Susanne Huber
American Journal of Human Biology, forthcoming
Objectives: Mutation-selection balance theory proposes that a balance of forces between constantly arising mildly harmful mutations and selection causes variation in genetic configuration and phenotypic condition. As mutations are predominantly deleterious, the entry of variation due to mutations is kept at low frequencies by selection. It has recently been demonstrated that nearly all de novo mutation are caused by paternal age.
Methods: We examined on basis of the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (n = 6,182) whether a subject's probability of having ever married as well as having ever reproduced is associated with that subject's father's age at subject's birth.
Results: We find that advanced paternal but not maternal age at subject's birth predicts a lower chance of ever being married and a higher chance of childlessness, even controlling for various confounders.
Conclusions: As marriage is a prerequisite of reproduction in this sample, we discuss that mate choice may provide a mechanism to prevent too high mutation load in the progeny.
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Association between Increased Emergency Contraception Availability and Risky Sexual Practices
Danielle Atkins & David Bradford
Health Services Research, forthcoming
Objective: We studied whether increased emergency contraception availability for women over age 18 was associated with a higher probability of risky sexual practices.
Data: A total of 34,030 individual/year observations on 3,786 women aged 18 and older were extracted from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997 from October 1999 through November 2009.
Study Design: We modeled three binary outcome variables: any sexual activity; sexual activity with more than one partner; and any sex without a condom for women with multiple partners for women in states with state-level policy changes (prior to the 2006 FDA ruling) and for women in states subject to only the national policy change both jointly and separately.
Findings: We found different results when estimating the state and federal changes separately. The national change was associated with a reduction in the probability of sexual activity, a reduction in the likelihood of reporting multiple partnerships, and there was no relationship between the national policy change and unprotected sexual activity. There was no relationship between the probability of sexual activity or multiple partnerships for women in states with their own policy changes, but we did find that women in these states were more likely to report unprotected sex.
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Does abortion reduce self-esteem and life satisfaction?
M.A. Biggs et al.
Quality of Life Research, November 2014, Pages 2505-2513
Purpose: This study aims to assess the effects of obtaining an abortion versus being denied an abortion on self-esteem and life satisfaction.
Methods: We present the first 2.5 years of a 5-year longitudinal telephone-interview study that follows 956 women who sought an abortion from 30 facilities across the USA. We examine the self-esteem and life satisfaction trajectories of women who sought and received abortions just under the facility’s gestational age limit, of women who sought and received abortions in their first trimester of pregnancy, and of women who sought abortions just beyond the facility gestational limit and were denied an abortion. We use adjusted mixed effects linear regression analyses to assess whether the trajectories of women who sought and obtained an abortion differ from those who were denied one.
Results: Women denied an abortion initially reported lower self-esteem and life satisfaction than women who sought and obtained an abortion. For all study groups, except those who obtained first trimester abortions, self-esteem and life satisfaction improved over time. The initially lower levels of self-esteem and life satisfaction among women denied an abortion improved more rapidly reaching similar levels as those obtaining abortions at 6 months to one year after abortion seeking. For women obtaining first trimester abortions, initially higher levels of life satisfaction remained steady over time.
Conclusions: There is no evidence that abortion harms women’s self-esteem or life satisfaction in the short term.
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Sonya Borrero et al.
Contraception, forthcoming
Objective: Unintended pregnancy is common and disproportionately occurs among low-income women. We conducted a qualitative study with low-income women to better typologize pregnancy intention, understand the relationship between pregnancy intention and contraceptive use, and identify the contextual factors that shape pregnancy intention and contraceptive behavior.
Study design: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with low-income, African-American and white women aged 18-45 recruited from reproductive health clinics in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to explore factors that influence women’s pregnancy-related behaviors. Narratives were analyzed using content analysis and the constant comparison method.
Results: Among the 66 participants (36 African-American and 30 white), we identified several factors that may impede our public health goal of increasing the proportion of pregnancies that are consciously desired and planned. First, women do not always perceive that they have reproductive control and therefore do not necessarily formulate clear pregnancy intentions. Second, the benefits of a planned pregnancy may not be evident. Third, because preconception intention and planning do not necessarily occur, decisions about the acceptability of a pregnancy are often determined after the pregnancy has already occurred. Finally, even when women express a desire to avoid pregnancy, their contraceptive behaviors are not necessarily congruent with their desires. We also identified several clinically relevant and potentially modifiable factors that help to explain this intention-behavior discrepancy, including women’s perceptions of low fecundity and their experiences with male partner contraceptive sabotage.
Conclusion: Our findings suggest that the current conceptual framework that views pregnancy-related behaviors from a strict planned behavior perspective may be limited, particularly among low-income populations.
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Is low fertility really a problem? Population aging, dependency, and consumption
Ronald Lee, Andrew Mason & members of the NTA Network
Science, 10 October 2014, Pages 229-234
Abstract:
Longer lives and fertility far below the replacement level of 2.1 births per woman are leading to rapid population aging in many countries. Many observers are concerned that aging will adversely affect public finances and standards of living. Analysis of newly available National Transfer Accounts data for 40 countries shows that fertility well above replacement would typically be most beneficial for government budgets. However, fertility near replacement would be most beneficial for standards of living when the analysis includes the effects of age structure on families as well as governments. And fertility below replacement would maximize per capita consumption when the cost of providing capital for a growing labor force is taken into account. Although low fertility will indeed challenge government programs and very low fertility undermines living standards, we find that moderately low fertility and population decline favor the broader material standard of living.
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Intergenerational Transfers And The Fertility-Income Relationship
Juan Carlos Córdoba & Marla Ripoll
Economic Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Evidence from cross-sectional data reveals a negative relationship between family income and fertility. This paper argues that constraints to intergenerational transfers are crucial for understanding this relationship. If parents could legally impose debt obligations on their children to recover the costs incurred in raising them, then fertility would be independent of parental income. A relationship between fertility and income arises when parents are unable to leave debts because of legal, enforcement, or moral constraints. This relationship is negative when the intergenerational elasticity of substitution is larger than one, case in which parental consumption is a good substitute for children's consumption.
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Paul Dolan & Caroline Rudisill
Health Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
Despite the best of intentions, we often act at the last minute when we are faced with a deadline. A recent recommendation by the English National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) to make In-Vitro Fertilisation (IVF) available to women up to 42 years of age instead of 39 intends to offer more women the chance of pregnancy. Given what we know about behavioural responses to what is, in essence, a deadline, the policy could lead to procrastination and fewer wanted pregnancies. We examine how many women it would take to delay trying for a baby for this policy to result in fewer pregnancies. We take a cohort of 1,000 women from age 34. If no women delay trying, the increased age on access to IVF results in 31 more pregnancies. Because of declining fertility with age, it would take only about a third of these women to delay trying for a baby until age 35 for there to be zero net benefits of increased IVF availability. If all women delayed by a year, the new policy will lead to 59 fewer pregnancies. We also estimate the implications for IVF treatment numbers as this has psychological and personal consequences. Our findings highlight how no policy sits in a behavioural vacuum and all policy decisions should consider the likely behavioural responses and incorporate them into their design and evaluation.
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Luseadra Mckerracher, Mark Collard & Joseph Henrich
Evolution and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
We report a study on nausea and vomiting of pregnancy (NVP) and pregnancy-related food aversions in a small-scale society from Yasawa Island, Fiji. Because NVP has rarely been studied quantitatively in small-scale populations, we begin with a detailed description of its expression among the women of Yasawa. We found that 66% of these women experience nausea and/or vomiting in tandem with the development of aversions to certain foods. This pattern of expression is similar to what has been documented for industrialized populations, and the prevalence of 66% is close to the industrialized mean prevalence of 69%. We then use the data from the women of Yasawa to evaluate the three main hypotheses that have been put forward to explain the evolution and ecological function of NVP. We show that food aversions of pregnancy focus preferentially on food types that are more likely to carry pathogens or contain chemical toxins. Such aversions do not focus on nutrient-dense foods or on frequently encountered foods. These findings are most consistent with a hypothesis that NVP, along with pregnancy-related aversions, evolved to motivate women to avoid exposure to diseases and other toxins when they are immune-compromised by pregnancy and during a critical period of embryo development. These findings contribute to a growing body of theoretical and empirical literature that suggests that NVP symptoms represent a series of adaptations rather than pathological responses to the physiological demands of pregnancy.
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Alexandra Alvergne & Virpi Lummaa
Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences, 7 December 2014
Abstract:
The negative wealth–fertility relationship brought about by market integration remains a puzzle to classic evolutionary models. Evolutionary ecologists have argued that this phenomenon results from both stronger trade-offs between reproductive and socioeconomic success in the highest social classes and the comparison of groups rather than individuals. Indeed, studies in contemporary low fertility settings have typically used aggregated samples that may mask positive wealth–fertility relationships. Furthermore, while much evidence attests to trade-offs between reproductive and socioeconomic success, few studies have explicitly tested the idea that such constraints are intensified by market integration. Using data from Mongolia, a post-socialist nation that underwent mass privatization, we examine wealth–fertility relationships over time and across a rural–urban gradient. Among post-reproductive women, reproductive fitness is the lowest in urban areas, but increases with wealth in all regions. After liberalization, a demographic–economic paradox emerges in urban areas: while educational attainment negatively impacts female fertility in all regions, education uniquely provides socioeconomic benefits in urban contexts. As market integration progresses, socio-economic returns to education increase and women who limit their reproduction to pursue education get wealthier. The results support the view that selection favoured mechanisms that respond to opportunities for status enhancement rather than fertility maximization.
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Perinatal Complications and Aging Indicators by Midlife
Idan Shalev et al.
Pediatrics, forthcoming
Background: Perinatal complications predict increased risk for morbidity and early mortality. Evidence of perinatal programming of adult mortality raises the question of what mechanisms embed this long-term effect. We tested a hypothesis related to the theory of developmental origins of health and disease: that perinatal complications assessed at birth predict indicators of accelerated aging by midlife.
Methods: Perinatal complications, including both maternal and neonatal complications, were assessed in the Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study cohort (N = 1037), a 38-year, prospective longitudinal study of a representative birth cohort. Two aging indicators were assessed at age 38 years, objectively by leukocyte telomere length (TL) and subjectively by perceived facial age.
Results: Perinatal complications predicted both leukocyte TL (β = −0.101; 95% confidence interval, −0.169 to −0.033; P = .004) and perceived age (β = 0.097; 95% confidence interval, 0.029 to 0.165; P = .005) by midlife. We repeated analyses with controls for measures of family history and social risk that could predispose to perinatal complications and accelerated aging, and for measures of poor health taken in between birth and the age-38 follow-up. These covariates attenuated, but did not fully explain the associations observed between perinatal complications and aging indicators.
Conclusions: Our findings provide support for early-life developmental programming by linking newborns’ perinatal complications to accelerated aging at midlife. We observed indications of accelerated aging “inside,” as measured by leukocyte TL, an indicator of cellular aging, and “outside,” as measured by perceived age, an indicator of declining tissue integrity. A better understanding of mechanisms underlying perinatal programming of adult aging is needed.