Low fertility: theories and empirical evidence

During the last decades, childlessness has increased continuously across Europe and has been gaining increasing significance in the demographic literature and socio-political discussion. Education-specific studies show that childlessness is a particularly widespread phenomenon among female university graduates. Based on the Generations and Gender Survey, we study fertility intentions of University graduates, concentrating on 2,800 university degree holders aged 27 to 40 years in western Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, France and Norway. We study how main life domains are associated with the intention to have a child. Based on the concept of life course and inspired by the concept of rush hour of life we identify determinants of fertility intentions. We examine associations between employment and relationship on the one hand and plans for starting a family on the other. The study reveals remarkably lower fertility intentions as well as substantial gender differences in Germany and Austria. Childbearing plans are most pronounced among university graduates around the age of thirty. What is associated with fertility intentions is not only the degree of institutionalisation but also the duration of the relationship. Moreover, amount of working hours is related to childbearing plans.

Kerala state in India has already reached below-replacement fertility level in the 1990s while the rest of India was experiencing high or mid-level fertility. With this backdrop, the objectives of this paper are two-fold; (a) to explore the plausible factors associated with the fertility transition in Kerala and its socioeconomic and health policy implications and (b) to identify lessons to be learnt from Kerala experience for fertility transition in middle or low income countries. The underlying factors that led to the fertility transition were explored using bi-variate and multi-variate techniques. An enhanced level of human development achieved, without a threshold level of economic growth, was likely to be the main contributor. Population momentum and ‘demographic dividends’ appear strong. Population density will take a staggering level of 1,101 persons per sq km in 2026 and its consequences are discussed. The tempo of population-ageing is also very high.

What are the replicable factors of Kerala experience in the midst of high fertility ? What are the lessons to be learnt from this experience relevant for low and middle income countries? These questions are dealt with in detail in this paper.

Drawing data from the Korea Labor and Income Panel Study that are fitted to Cox proportional hazard model, we attempt to uncover causal impacts of female labor force participation on childbirth decision in South Korea. To control for the dynamic processes in which soon-to-be mother choose to get out of labor force to give birth, we evaluate empirical datasets using three different birth-month lag scenarios: no lag, five and eight month lag. We evaluate parity-specific effects even though parities are limited to the first and second child due to small sample size in higher parities. Our preliminary results suggest that regarding the first childbirth decision, female labor force participation does not seem to make a chilling dent in fertility hazards. Female labor force participation, however, appears to affect the second childbirth decision in a negative direction though the impacts are not as great as widely publicized. Combining two parities, we find somewhat negative impacts of female labor force participation on fertility hazards. These results vary by different lag scenarios with biggest impacts detected in no lag scenario and lowest impacts observed in eight month lag scenario. Finally, these patterns do not change by different measures of female labor force participation.

The main purposes of this study are to describe college students' recognition and attitudes toward marriage and childbearing and to explore the factors impacting on their recognition and attitudes toward marriage and childbearing in South Korea.. 440 questionnaires were collected from college students in five colleges and universities in South Korea. The survey was carried out from October 12 to October 22, 2011. Findings of this study are as follows: First, it turns out that rearing place, marital values, and values for children increase odds ratio of the pro-marital values in the logistic regression analysis. Second, sex, age, and values for marriage have statistically significant relationships with the prospective age at first marriage among college students. Third, rearing place, values for marriage, and values for children, increase odds ratio of the willingness of childbearing in the future. Fourth, sex, religion, attitudes against divorce, and values for children have statistically significant impacts on the number of the wanted children in the future. Finally, we argue that population education program need to be launched in the colleges in order to increase marital willingness and childbearing willingness of the college students which, in turn, will help to alleviate the lowest low fertility in the South Korea.

Fertility level of a population is an aggregated outcome of individual’s fertility behaviors which are in turn determined by their fertility desire. There are substantial differences in understanding the relationship between fertility desire and fertility behavior. In order to describing the transition of fertility desire, fertility behavior and fertility level and examining the intriguing relationship between them in the context of low fertility, the paper presents empirical evidence from Shanghai, China, where that fertility level of the population has been at a very low level for a very long period.
Based on the results of several surveys in Shanghai since the early 1980’s, this paper describes and analyzes the transition of fertility desire in the past 30 years, with a focus on the desired number of children. The findings show that the desired number of children of people in Shanghai has been in the decreasing tendency, and the level is far below 2. The comparison between the desired number of children based on those surveys and total fertility rate in the corresponding years shows that the actual fertility level is lower than fertility desire expressed by the people in the surveys in Shanghai.

While there has been a growing literature on low fertility in developed Western countries, little is known about the phenomenon in the East. It is a question of great interest whether findings from the former apply to the very different context in the latter. Using 2008, 2010, and 2012 waves of the Korean Longitudinal Survey of Women and Families, first, this paper provides up-to-date pictures of Korean women’s childbearing. We describe whether women planned to have a child in 2008, whether they gave birth between 2008 and 2012, and how the two fertility outcomes are related. Next, we examine what determined the outcomes with logit regressions, focusing on women of parity one. As for determinants, we pay attention to husbands’ and parents’ help with domestic labor and use of formal childcare services.
Results showed fertility intentions were good predictors of fertility behavior. While both fertility intentions and actual childbearing were remarkably low among women with two or more children, parity progression of women with one child seemed relatively malleable. Gender inequality in division of domestic labor was striking. Husbands’ help had a positive impact on fertility intentions. Use of formal childcare affected fertility behavior positively. These findings have implications for other Asian countries with low fertility.

During the course of the 20th century, higher education was almost universally linked to lower and later fertility levels among women.

This study aims to make a case for a global comparative research on completed fertility by cohort, sex, and level of education. We review the existing evidence and main theoretical perspectives, put together a variety of research questions, arguments and hypotheses, identify data to be used, and define future research agenda on the topic.

A broad focus on global cross-country perspective will facilitate research into institutional determinants of the observed education-fertility differentials. The question of global convergence or divergence in education-fertility differentials will play a prominent role in our research. We will systematically explore conditions leading to diminishing or persistent education-fertility differentials across cohorts, including the roles of different family policies, norms and values pertaining to reproduction and childcare, gender systems, family and partnership patterns. We will also analyse the gradients of male and female fertility by level of education and link our empirical findings with the existing theoretical perspectives. Finally, we will explore hypotheses linking aggregate cohort intentions earlier in life with eventually completed fertility.

This paper examines the role of micro-level gender equity in explaining low fertility. Building on Peter McDonald’s (2000a; 2000b) theory of gender equity, I expand the concept of gender equity to micro-level by incorporating individual lived experience, attitudes associated with gender roles, and women’s household decision making ability. I select South Korea as a case study in which both institutional forces of lowest-low fertility and massive social and economic changes come into play in shaping women’s childbearing behavior. I address the following two research questions: What are the factors that influence women’s fertility goal attainment over time? Does micro-level gender equity play a large role? This paper is based on three waves of the Korean Longitudinal Survey of Women & Families from 2007 to 2010. These results can expand upon McDonald, and enhance the ways in which how gender equity can be better conceptualized and operationalized for studies of fertility variations across individuals, even within a single context with lowest-low fertility. The individual-level investigation highlighting the role of micro-level gender equity may provide insights into women’s resilience in making larger family preferences within the institutional context that support lowest-low fertility.

Much research has been done on the influence of ideational factors on family formation in countries of Europe. According to the second demographic transition theory, due to an increase in economic affluence and social security, people have a strong preference to self-actualization and individuation. As a result of this, cohabitation and divorce gain popularity, while early marriage and childbearing lose popularity in Europe. However, few studies have been conducted regarding the impact of value-orientation on family formation patterns in Japan.

This paper attempts to examine the influence of ideational factors on fertility behavior in Japan. Data come from the Japanese Generations and Gender Survey. Since the survey is a panel survey, we can scrutinize the causal relation between attitudes and childbearing behavior. Multivariate analyses including latent class hazard analysis have been carried out to examine the effect of attitudes on fertility behavior. Results showed that attitudinal factor plays an important role in determining the pattern of childbirth in Japan.

This study examines the association between educational attainment and transition to second birth in Europe in comparative perspective. Previous research suggests that in several countries women’s educational attainment is positively related to second birth intensity, whereas other countries show non-positive or negative relationship. It is also known that analysis of this relationship is complicated due to confounding factors. We investigate the problem using data from the EU Statistics of Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC), specifically the 2005 and 2011 surveys that cover 29 countries. Unlike most previous studies, our research focuses mainly on larger geographical units. We estimate separate discrete-time event history models for major regions and sub-regions of Europe; this analytical approach is complemented by multi-level modelling that provides additional insight to both overall pattern and country-specific deviations. With regard to women’s as well as partner’s educational attainment, several types of relationship to second births are distinguished. We find considerable diversity in both the direction and strength of the education gradient across regions in contemporary Europe.