The Fertility Transition

1
Chapter 6

• The Fertility Transition

2
Chapter Outline

• What Is Fertility?
• How High Could Fertility Levels Be?
• Why Was Fertility High For Most Of Human History?
• The Preconditions For A Decline In Fertility
• Ideational Changes That Must Take Place
• Motivations For Lower Fertility Levels

3
Chapter Outline

• How Can Fertility Be Controlled?
• How Do We Measure Changes In Fertility?
• How Is The Fertility Transition Accomplished?
• Geographic Variability In The Fertility
  Transition
• Case Studies In The Fertility Transition

4
Fertility Transition

• Shift from high fertility, with minimal
  individual control, to low fertility, which is
  entirely under a womans control.
• Involves a delay in childbearing and an earlier
  end to childbearing.
• Frees women and men from unwanted parenthood and
  allows them to space their children.

5
Fecundity

• A fecund person can produce children an
  infecund (sterile) person cannot.
• Couples who have tried unsuccessfully for at
  least 12 months to conceive a child are usually
  called infertile by physicians.
• The 2002 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG)
  showed that 7 of American couples (where the
  wife was aged 15 to 44) are infecund/infertile by
  that criterion.

6
Hutterite Fertility Compared with Mexico, United
States, and Canada Fertility Levels
7
Period Measures of Fertility

• Commonly used in population studies, includes
• Crude birth rate
• General fertility rate
• Child-woman ratio
• Age-specific fertility rate
• Total fertility rate
• Gross reproduction rate
• Net reproduction rate

8
Preconditions for a Substantial Fertility Decline

• Acceptance of calculated choice as a valid
  element in marital fertility.
• Perception of advantages from reduced fertility.
• Knowledge and mastery of effective techniques of
  control.

9
The Supply-Demand Framework

• The demographic transition envisions a world in
  which the normal state of affairs is a balance
  between births and deaths.
• High fertility, may help households avoid risk in
  the context of low economic development and weak
  institutional stability, especially when children
  generate a positive net flow of income to the
  parents.

10
The Demographic Link Between the Fertility
Transition and Reproductive Health
11
The Education of Women Is an Important Part of
the Fertility Transition
12
The Innovation/Diffusion and Cultural
Perspective

• Two theories of social stratification have strong
  implications for fertility behavior
• Cultural innovation takes place in higher social
  strata as a result of privilege, education, and
  resources, lower social strata adopt new
  preferences through imitation.
• Rigid social stratification or closure of class
  or caste inhibits downward cultural mobility.

13
Dealing with Unwanted Children

• Infanticide, or general neglect or inattention
  that leads to early death.
• Fosterage of child by another family that needs
  or can afford it.
• Orphanage - involves abandoning a child so she or
  he is likely to be found and cared for by
  strangers.

14
The Interconnecting Influences on the Fertility
Transition
15
Intermediate Variables - Social Factors Influence
on Fertility

• Exposure to intercourse.
• Formation and dissolution of unions.
• Age of entry into sexual unions.
• Permanent celibacy.
• Amount of reproductive period spent after or
  between unions.
• Unions broken by divorce, separation, or
  desertion.
• Unions broken by death.

16
Intermediate Variables - Social Factors Influence
on Fertility

• Exposure to intercourse within unions.
• Voluntary abstinence.
• Involuntary abstinence
• from impotence, illness, unavoidable but
  temporary separations
• Coital frequency
• excluding periods of abstinence

17
Intermediate Variables - Social Factors Influence
on Fertility

• Exposure to conception.
• Fecundity or infecundity, as affected by
  involuntary causes, including breast-feeding.
• Use or nonuse of contraception.
• By mechanical and chemical means.
• By other means.
• Fecundity or infecundity as affected by voluntary
  causes (sterilization, medical treatment).

18
Intermediate Variables - Social Factors Influence
on Fertility

• Factors affecting gestation and successful
  parturition.
• Fetal mortality from involuntary causes
  (miscarriage).
• Fetal mortality from voluntary causes (induced
  abortion).

19
Fertility Control Women in the U.S.
20
Fertility Control Women in the U.S.
21
Fertility Control Women in the U.S.
22
Abortion Rates Throughout the World
23
Abortion Rates Throughout the World
24
Abortion Rates Throughout the World
25
Abortion Rates Throughout the World
26
Higher Levels of Contraceptive Use Lead to Lower
Levels of Fertility
27
Global Variability in Contraceptive Utilization
28
Changes in ASFRs in the Context of the Fertility
Transition
29
Regional Differences in the Fertility Transition,
1950-2050
30
The Fertility Transition in England
31
The Fertility Transition in China
32
The Baby Boom, the Baby Bust, and the Baby
Boomlet in the United States
33
Changes in Fertility by Ethnic Group, United
States, 19902002