Gendering family composition: Sex preferences for children and childbearing behavior in the Nordic countries

Abstract

It has been argued that a society's gender system may influence parents' sex preferences for children. If this is true, one should expect to find no evidence of such preferences in countries with a high level of gender equality. In this article, we exploit data from population registers from Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden to examine continuities and changes in parental sex preferences in the Nordic countries during the past three to four decades. First, we do not observe an effect of the sex of the first born child on second-birth risks. Second, we detect a distinct preference for at least one child of each sex among parents of two children. For third births, Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish parents seem to develop a preference for having a daughter, while Finns exhibit a significant preference for having a son. These findings show that modernization and more equal opportunities for women and men do not necessarily lead to parental gender indifference. On the contrary, they may even result in new sex preferences.

Daughter preference in Japan: A reflection on gender role attitudes?

“…While recent research on developed countries has used indirect behavioral measures to assess gender preference. such as the effect of sex of previous children on (intentions of) having another child (Brockmann 2001;Andersson et al 2006;Hank and Kohler 2000;Hank and Kohler 2003;Pollard and Morgan 2002), I consider asking direct questions for their preference to be appropriate for the purposes of this study. Because the odds of wanting/having a third or even a second child are low due to social and economic constraints in very low fertility contexts, it is likely that a desire for an additional child in response to gender preference may not be translated into actual behavior.…”

“…To further test this gender equality argument, Andersson et al (2006) replicated Pollard and Morgan's work in Scandinavian contexts using population registrars from Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. Although the authors expected parental gender indifference in these countries for their high level of gender equality, they did not find any evidence for parental gender indifference but rather a clear preference for one child of each sex to this date.…”

“…Moreover, they found a preference for a daughter for third births in three of the countries examined which further suggests that modernization and gender equality does not lead to gender indifference. In fact, the authors imply that increasing gender equality may bring "new" sex preferences such as daughter preference (Andersson et al 2006).…”

The causal effect of an additional sibling on completed fertility: An estimation of intergenerational fertility correlations by looking at siblings of twins

“…Different parity progression ratios based on sex composition of children are found in developed countries (e.g., Andersson et al 2006;Kolk and Schnettler 2013). This approach is used in ongoing work examining intergenerational transmission of fertility (Cools and Hart 2014).…”

Governmental Support for Families and Obstacles to Fertility in East Asia and Other Industrialized Regions

“…In principle, a preference for having at least one boy will increase fertility in settings with generally low or moderate fertility and where the alternatives to achieving such a goalsex-specific abortion or excess female mortality-are deemed unacceptable. However, sex preferences are typically weak in rich countries outside Asia (Andersson et al 2006). Also, the "insurance effect," "replacement effect," and other effects of mortality on fertility that are important in many parts of the world have little relevance in more-developed countries, given their very low infant and child mortality.…”