Detecting the Evolution of Deliberate Fertility Control before the Demographic Transition in Germany

Amialchuk, Aliaksandr; Dimitrova, Elitsa

doi:10.4054/demres.2012.27.19

Cited by 20 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 39 publications

(73 reference statements)

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“…This approach limits the effect of the variable to the period when it is most likely that a possible termination of breast-feeding could influence the fecundity of the woman. This is the same method as used in a number of other fertility studies applying event-history analysis (see, e.g., Alter 1988 ; Amialchuk and Dimitrova 2012 ). This strategy does not discriminate between a biological effect of truncated breast-feeding and a replacement response to infant mortality in the very early stages of life.…”

Section: Methodological Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agency in Fertility Decisions in Western Europe During the Demographic Transition: A Comparative Perspective

et al. 2017

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We use a set of linked reproductive histories taken from Sweden, the Netherlands, and Spain for the period 1871–1960 to address key issues regarding how reproductive change was linked specifically to mortality and survivorship and more generally to individual agency. Using event-history analysis, this study investigates how the propensity to have additional children was influenced by the number of surviving offspring when reproductive decisions were made. The results suggest that couples were continuously regulating their fertility to achieve reproductive goals. Families experiencing child fatalities show significant increases in the hazard of additional births. In addition, the sex composition of the surviving sibset also appears to have influenced reproductive decisions in a significant but changing way. The findings offer strong proof of active decision-making during the demographic transition and provide an important contribution to the literature on the role of mortality for reproductive change.

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Section: Methodological Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agency in Fertility Decisions in Western Europe During the Demographic Transition: A Comparative Perspective

et al. 2017

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“…Earlier research suggests that parents try to space their children to fit their household's economic situation (Van Bavel 2004;Amialchuck and Dimitrova 2012). Since the household situation can change with age, the paper presents the results of additional models studying the association between patterns of spatial proximity between kin and the occurrence of a birth event in a specific year before and after three years since the last childbirth.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Patterns of spatial proximity and the timing and spacing of bearing children

Mönkediek¹

2020

DemRes

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BACKGROUNDPeople's demographic decision-making is embedded in regional cultural contexts that include regional patterns of family organization called family systems. Although previous research has shown that family systems explain regional variation in fertility, it has focused mainly on historical or developing societies. Processes of modernization have led to substantial changes in family structures and values and to an overhaul of the traditional family formation system in most developed countries. Therefore, questions arise regarding whether family systems also influence fertility in contemporary developed societies. OBJECTIVEThe paper addresses the research question by examining the association between regional patterns of spatial proximity between kin and (1) the age at first birth, (2) the length of the interbirth interval between the first and second child, and (3) the length of the interbirth interval between the second and third child. In this context, the paper controls for changes in the associations occurring with age. DATA AND METHODSThe paper derives regional indicators of spatial proximity between kin for 54 regions in nine European countries using the first two waves of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) (N = 38,484). The paper studies the association between these regional indicators and fertility using individual-level data from the Generations and Gender Survey (GGS) (N = 58,689). The analysis relies on a set of discrete-time hazard models.

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“…Another line of research has argued that pretransition populations controlled birth spacing in response to annual variations in living standards or to numbers of dependent children (Amialchuk and Dimitrova 2012;Cinnirella et al 2017Cinnirella et al , 2019Dribe and Scalone 2010;Kolk 2011;Van Bavel 2004;Van Bavel and Kok 2004). Such control in response to material conditions is not in itself evidence of parity-specific control.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Twins Support the Absence of Parity-Dependent Fertility Control in Pretransition Populations

2020

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A conclusion of the European Fertility Project in 1986 was that pretransition populations mostly displayed natural fertility, where parity-dependent birth control was absent. This conclusion has recently been challenged for England by new empirical results and has also been widely rejected by theorists of long-run economic growth, where pre-industrial fertility control is integral to most models. In this study, we use the accident of twin births to show that for three Western European-derived pre-industrial populations-namely, England (1730-1879), France (1670-1788), and Québec (1621-1835)-we find no evidence for parity-dependent control of marital fertility. If a twin was born in any of these populations, family size increased by 1 compared with families with a singleton birth at the same parity and mother age, with no reduction of subsequent fertility. Numbers of children surviving to age 14 also increased. Twin births also show no differential effect on fertility when they occurred at high parities; this finding is in contrast to populations where fertility is known to have been controlled by at least some families, such as in England, 1900-1949, where a twin birth increased average births per family by significantly less than 1.

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Detecting the Evolution of Deliberate Fertility Control before the Demographic Transition in Germany

Cited by 20 publications

References 39 publications

Agency in Fertility Decisions in Western Europe During the Demographic Transition: A Comparative Perspective

Agency in Fertility Decisions in Western Europe During the Demographic Transition: A Comparative Perspective

Patterns of spatial proximity and the timing and spacing of bearing children

Twins Support the Absence of Parity-Dependent Fertility Control in Pretransition Populations

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