137 results
Search Results
2. Some remarks on the paper by Julia Ericksen et al., 'Fertility patterns and trends among the Old Order Amish'
- Author
-
Louis Henry
- Subjects
History ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Old Order Amish ,Fertility ,Residence ,Sociology ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
At the present time there are very few populations, whose members do not practise contraception at all, or only to a very limited extent, and for whom accurate data on nuptiality and fertility exist. Among populations of European residence or origin, there are only a few groups who reject any limitation of families for religious reasons. One of these, the Hutterites, has already been studied; the other, the Old Order Amish, is studied in Ericksen's papers, and my preceding remarks point to the importance of this study.
- Published
- 2011
3. Reply to the discussion of our paper ‘Explanations of the fertility crisis in modern societies: A search for commonalities’
- Author
-
Thomas Schindlmayr and John C. Caldwell
- Subjects
Value (ethics) ,History ,education.field_of_study ,Liberalization ,Population ,Social change ,Demographic transition ,Social value orientations ,Modernization theory ,Environmental movement ,Sociology ,Positive economics ,Social science ,education ,Demography - Abstract
Billari Frejka and Macura broadly endorse our paper while adding valuable supplementary and complementary material. We concur with most of the regional and technical elaborations they propose. However we take issue with some of the points raised by van de Kaa and Hobcraft most of which refer to our penultimate paragraph. Before turning to these we will review some general observations that have underlain our thinking. We assume that no one regards the Western demographic transition over the last century or two as being independent of the Industrial Revolution as being something that would have happened if incomes had stayed at eighteenth-century levels. Similarly it is difficult for us to imagine that rising incomes in the second half of the twentieth century did not facilitate a culture of sexual liberalization easy divorce and family reconstitution. Yet Aries’ two brilliant contributions barely mention economic and material changes. The same is true to a substantial degree of much writing about the Second Demographic Transition (SDT) and is certainly the case in van de Kaa’s contribution to this discussion. Our critics also understate the importance of the 1960s breakthrough in contraceptive technology and ignore the importance of the change of attitudes to high fertility (or any fertility) which came with the identification of the global ‘population explosion’ and that was to be reinforced by the environmental movement. Van de Kaa is baffled by our statement that the world demographic transition involves a movement to the position where children are of no immediate value to their parents. In fact children have been of value for most of human history and still are in many populations but not in the modern West. (excerpt)
- Published
- 2004
4. Papers in Jewish Demography 1985
- Author
-
Geoffrey Alderman
- Subjects
History ,Anthropology ,Judaism ,Sociology ,Social science ,Demography - Published
- 1990
5. Sexual Initiation and Premarital Childbearing in Sub-Saharan Africa.
- Author
-
Meekers, Dominique
- Subjects
TEENAGE pregnancy ,SOCIAL problems ,SOCIAL control ,SOCIAL indicators ,SOCIAL conflict ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
Many studies have suggested that unmarried adolescent childbearing is becoming a social problem in many countries of sub-Saharan Africa, because it tends to lead to school drop-outs, illegal abortions, and child abandonment. To date, the motivations for adolescent childbearing remain poorly understood. One point of view is that unmarried adolescent childbearing results from a breakdown of social controls by the elders over young people. Others have argued that adolescent childbearing is a form of rational adaptation; a means to achieve a specific goal. For example, girls may choose to become pregnant if they believe that a pregnancy will lead to marriage. In this paper adolescent sexual activity and premarital childbearing in seven sub-Saharan African countries are examined with data from Demographic and Health Surveys. In a first section, the impact of socio-economic indicators on adolescent sexual and reproductive behaviour is examined; a subsequent section is focused on the motivation for different types of adolescent behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1994
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
6. Individual and Community Aspects of Women's Status and Fertility in Rural Bangladesh.
- Author
-
Balk, Deborah
- Subjects
SOCIOLOGY of women ,FERTILITY ,PROXY ,WOMEN'S societies & clubs ,SOCIAL status ,SOCIAL conditions of women - Abstract
This paper examines the relationship between women's status and fertility in two regions of rural Bangladesh. Based on individual and household-level survey data, women's status is measured through four constructs. The covariates of these four aspects of women's status vary considerably and confirm the view that women's status is conceptually and operationally complex. For all aspects, however, variation between villages accounts for the largest share of explainable variance. Proxy measures of status do not provide uniform relationships with all facets of status. Further, the paper shows that women's status is an important determinant of fertility; of the variance in total children ever born that can be explained by factors other than age, nearly 30 per cent is due to direct measures of women's status; this is as much as can be explained by all other socio-economic variables combined. Thus, models of fertility that rely solely on proxy measures of women's status will be underspecified. In addition, measurement of women's status that does not account for the bias that women's status and fertility are simultaneously determined in patriarchal societies will misstate the direction, and underestimate the effects, of status on fertility. Lastly, different dimensions of women's status influence fertility differently - in terms of magnitude, direction and statistical significance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1994
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
7. Analysis of Patterns of Immigration and Absorption of Immigrants.
- Author
-
Eisenstadt, S. N.
- Subjects
EMIGRATION & immigration ,IMMIGRANTS ,ASSIMILATION (Sociology) ,SOCIAL problems ,SOCIALIZATION ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
The paper analyzes patterns of immigration and absorption of immigrants. The process of immigration is a process of physical transition from one society to another involving considerable frustrations and giving rise to many social problem among immigrants. The research is conducted with assumptions that there are three main interdependent indices of adaptation and assimilation of immigrants within their new country : institutional integration, acculturation, and personal adjustment and integration of immigrants. The research paper examines some of these implicit assumptions in order to estimate their importance for a framework of comparative analysis, and suggests such a tentative framework. The paper then attempts to apply this framework to the analysis of concrete cases of migration and assimilation of immigrants. The types of pluralistic structures arising through the absorption of immigrants are determined by the immigrants' own motivations, by the demands made on them by the absorbing society, and by the possibilities open to them in that society.
- Published
- 1953
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
8. Relationships between period and cohort life expectancy: Gaps and lags.
- Author
-
Goldstein, JoshuaR. and Wachter, KennethW.
- Subjects
LIFE expectancy ,DEVELOPED countries ,MORTALITY ,SOCIAL indicators ,LONGEVITY ,DEMOGRAPHY ,PRODUCTIVE life span ,AGE groups ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This paper offers an empirical and analytic foundation for regarding period life expectancy as a lagged indicator of the experience of real cohorts in populations experiencing steady improvement in mortality. We find that current period life expectancy in the industrialized world applies to cohorts born some 40-50 years ago. Lags track an average age at which future years of life are being gained, in a sense that we make precise. Our findings augment Ryder's classic results on period-cohort translation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2006
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
9. The ABC of demographic behaviour: How the interplays of alleles, brains, and contexts over the life course should shape research aimed at understanding population processes.
- Author
-
Hobcraft, John
- Subjects
DIVORCE ,MARRIAGE ,CHILDBIRTH ,EMIGRATION & immigration ,SOCIOLOGY ,LIFE (Biology) ,PHILOSOPHY of biology - Abstract
This paper proposes core innovations in the strategy of research on demographic behaviour. One aim is a shift of attention away from events and towards a focus on dynamic processes and their interplay: away from a preoccupation with marriage and divorce, births, deaths, migrations, and household structure towards a broader perspective that takes account of partnership and intimacy, parenthood, potential and well-being, position in society and space, and personal ties. Another aim is a much closer engagement with genetics, neuroscience, psychology, and behavioural economics. A third aim is a strategy that pays more attention to pathways within the individual, to the processes entailed when the individual interacts with various contexts, and to progressions that involve the interplay of the pathways and processes through the life course. These shifts of emphasis, which have already begun to occur, require a systematic reassessment of priorities for research on demographic behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2006
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
10. Latin American Households in Comparative Perspective.
- Author
-
de Vos, Susan
- Subjects
HOUSEHOLDS ,LATIN Americans ,SOCIOLOGY ,SOCIAL sciences ,CITIES & towns ,ETHNOLOGY - Abstract
Comparative family sociology has had little to say about the Latin American family or household despite it links to a European colonial culture mixed with a distinct set of indigenous and historical circumstances. In this paper tentative judgements are put forward about the similarities and differences between the Western and Latin American household by examining four of its dimensions: the household's relative complexity, the separate residence of conjugal units, the incidence of households headed by women, and the incidence of household members being unrelated to the head. Data come from the World Fertility Survey household files gathered during the middle 1970s in six countries: Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, the Dominican Republic, Colombia and Peru. We find that household complexity in the six countries is intermediate between that of the West and East. Many of the households are extended laterally instead of vertically, because conjugal couples tend to reside in separate households, but often live with unmarried relatives as well. In addition, a high level of marital instability results in a significant proportion of households headed by women, many of them containing members of the extended family. Finally, whereas the circulation of young unmarried people of both sexes was common in rural areas in the West, being an unrelated individual in another's household is most common in urban areas among females between 15 and 19 years old. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1987
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
11. Polygyny among Arabs.
- Author
-
Chamie, J.
- Subjects
POLYGAMY ,POLYGYNY ,ARABS ,MARRIED people ,POPULATION ,DEMOGRAPHIC surveys - Abstract
Although Arabs are frequently characterized as possessing a harem of veiled and secluded wives, relatively little is actually known about the extent of polygyny among them. In this paper we present an examination of the levels and trends of polygyny in Arab countries in North Africa and Western Asia. The data are obtained primarily from the population censuses of 13 countries, and the registration records of marriage contracts for several countries. The period covers roughly the last three decades. These data also permit the analysis on a longitudinal basis for some countries, of differentials in polygyny by age, urban-rural residence, education, occupation and employment status. A number of findings of this study differ from commonly held views about polygynous Arab marriages. For example, the practice appears to be neither extensive nor uniform throughout the Arab countries. In addition, the trend in its prevalence varies between different countries. While in some countries the practice is decreasing, in others it seems to be increasing and in still others it has remained unchanged. The implications of the findings are discussed and suggestions are offered for areas of further research on the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1986
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
12. Demographic Changes in East Malaysia and their Relationship with those in the Peninsula 1960-80.
- Author
-
Kwok, K. K. and Leete, R.
- Subjects
DEMOGRAPHY ,LIFE expectancy ,LONGEVITY ,QUALITY of life ,ETHNICITY - Abstract
Hardly anything is known about the demography of East Malaysia, that is of the lesser developed regions of Sabah and Sarawak, because of the wide range of deficiencies in the available data. This paper uses a range of indirect methods to construct a demographic profile of Sabah and Sarawak over the period 1960 to 1980. Comparisons are made between these areas and Peninsular Malaysia and some overall Malaysian estimates are given. The study suggests that between 1965 and 1980 there were large gains in life expectancy among the indigenous communities in Sabah and Sarawak, although their life expectancies are still shorter than those of the Chinese. Differentials in life chances between these regions and Peninsular Malaysia narrowed appreciably during the 1970s. Over the same period there were falls in levels of fertility. These were most spectacular among the Chinese communities and the groups living in and around the urban areas in Sarawak. There has been some decline in fertility among the indigenous groups in Sabah but current levels remain higher than among the indigenous groups in Sarawak and the Malays in the Peninsula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1986
13. The Effects of Post-marital Childbearing on Divorce and Remarriage : An Application of Hazards Models with Time-dependent Covariates.
- Author
-
Suchindran, C. M., Koo, Helen P., and Griffith, Janet D.
- Subjects
DIVORCE ,MARITAL conflict ,INTERPERSONAL conflict ,CHILDREN ,REMARRIAGE ,STATISTICAL correlation - Abstract
This article examines the impact of children born during marital dissolution on the probabilities and timing of women's divorce and remarriage and explore whether the new children and those already present modify each other's effects on these outcomes. In studying the influence of post-marital childbearing on the probabilities of divorce and remarriage, an unexamined but significant problem in the area of marriage and childbearing. The present paper also provide an illustration of an application of this useful new technique. The impact of children on the processes of divorce and remarriage is an important topic for research. Both the effects of children living at the time of the dissolution of the marriage and the effects of those born to women while separated or divorced are important, as each has significant but different implications for the process of family formation. Previous researchers, however, have either examined only the impact of children already born at the time of breakdown or have not distinguished between these children and those born after the dissolution. Children are born to parents whose marriages have broken down relatively frequently in the United States. Data collected in 1970 showed that the probability of a birth within 48 months of separation or widowhood was 0.26. Although the post-marital birth rate has since decreased, it remains substantial. Because of the sharp increase in divorce rates after 1970 and a recent apparent delay in remarriage, more women will remain in a martially disrupted state for a longer period.
- Published
- 1985
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
14. The Formal Theory of Social Mobility.
- Author
-
Prais, S. J.
- Subjects
SOCIAL mobility ,FEMALES ,SOCIOLOGY ,GENDER ,STATISTICS ,OCCUPATIONAL mobility - Abstract
The essence of freedom consists in the absence of restraint and an election or any other concrete instance of choosing is generally deemed to have been free if each voter had an unrestricted choice between several alternatives, of which not casting a vote may have been one. This approach is objective because it is based on "post factum" data reflecting actual behaviour in a given situation and it is statistical in so far as the analysis embraces the decisions taken by the full membership of the selected group. But diversity alone does not necessarily indicate the absence of restraint, because variety can be enforced just as effectively as uniformity. If, for example, the actual statistical spread of the choices can be traced back to the definite orders of an authority, the actual freedom displaced is nil. There are also instances where, though the factor itself is unavoidable, its consequences are not. Take sex, for instance, as a determinant of choice of profession. Whereas it is hardly a practical proposition to alter the sex of a girl who wants to pursue a profession at present reserved to males, it would not be impossible to throw all professions open to both sexes.
- Published
- 1955
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
15. Books and Publications Received.
- Subjects
BOOKS ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This article presents list of books received by the journal "Population Studies." Some of the books are "Mexican and Central American Population and U.S. Immigration Policy," edited by Frank D. Bean, Jurgen Schmandt and Sideny Weintraub, "A Case for Promoting Breastfeeding in Projects to Limit Fertility," by Alan Berg and Susan Brems, "Adapting Social Security to the Emerging Needs of a Changing Society," "The Flexibility of Retirement Age," "India's Historical Demography," edited by Tim Dyson, "Women As Mothers in Pre-Industrial England," edited by Valerie Fidles, "Pregnancy, Contraception and Family Planning Services in Industrialized Countries," by Aida Torres, "Urban Population Development in Western Europe From the Late Eighteenth to the Early Twentieth Century," edited by Richard Lawton and Robert Lee, "Reproduction and Social Organization in Sub-Saharan Africa," edited by Ron J. Lesthaeghe, "Women and Population Dynamics" edited by K. Mahadevan, "The New Politics of Welfare. An Agenda for the 1990s?," edited by Michael McCarthy, and others.
- Published
- 1990
16. Momentum under a gradual approach to zero growth.
- Author
-
Schoen, Robert and Kim, Young J.
- Subjects
POPULATION ,HUMAN fertility ,CHILDBIRTH ,DEMOGRAPHY ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
A population's growth potential is significantly underestimated by conventional calculations of population momentum which assume an immediate drop to replacement level fertility. Here we assume that the growth rate of births linearly declines to zero over a specified time interval, and find simple and intuitively meaningful expressions for the size of the ultimate birth cohort and the resultant population momentum. In particular, we find that the increase in the number of births over the transition is equal to growth at the initial rate for half the time needed to attain a constant birth level. Thus our formula readily calculates the growth potential of a population under a gradual approach to stationarity without the need for a numerical projection. Calculations for actual and hypothetical populations are presented to show the demographic impact of such gradual approaches to zero growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1998
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
17. Anchored Narratives: The Story and Findings of Half a Century of Research into the Determinants of Fertility.
- Author
-
Van De Kaa, D. J.
- Subjects
- *
FERTILITY , *REPRODUCTION , *SOCIAL change , *SOCIAL history , *SOCIOLOGY , *SOCIAL sciences - Abstract
This paper reviews half a century of research into the determinants of fertility. It is argued that the quest for the determinants of fertility behaviour and change during that period can best be interpreted as the development of a series of sub-narratives from different disciplinary perspectives and orientations. These are normally based upon the initial narrative of the demographic transition and usually take the form of a verbal theory illustrated by a 'box and arrow' diagram. On occasions formalization has been attempted. Different parts of the initial narrative have been highlighted at different times depending on policy interest, improvements in technical skills, availability of data, changes in social setting, and the degree of satisfaction with the dominant sub-narrative of the day. There is every reason to believe that the research process identified will continue and will lead to a further accumulation of knowledge. In fact, all important variables have probably already been identified. That it will, ultimately, lead to a single, consolidated narrative fully satisfactory for all settings and for all time is, however, highly unlikely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1996
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
18. Risk and Fertility : A Reply to Robinson.
- Author
-
Cain, Mead
- Subjects
FERTILITY ,RISK ,INSURANCE ,SOCIOLOGISTS ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This article presents a response by the author on the comments of sociologist W.C. Robinson's on his article related to fertility, published in the journal Population Studies. The author says that notably, his analysis of fertility in Bangladesh has led him to conclude that one should not expect the security motive for having children to vary substantially within rural areas, and, consequently, given current levels of infant and child mortality, one should not expect fertility to vary systematically across region or economic class. Fertility may vary systematically for other reasons, but not because of the security motive. As important as this conclusion, the underlying logic also seems to have escaped Robinson. Robinson may not agree with this position, but it does not serve the purpose of constructive debate for him to pretend that my position is different. This he does most gratingly in the second half of his comment where he formulates various empirical tests of the proposition. Robinson is puzzled by the proposition that children could provide insurance against risk.
- Published
- 1986
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
19. Minimal Household Units: A New Approach to the Analysis of Household Formation.
- Author
-
Ermisch, J. F. and Overton, Elizabeth
- Subjects
HOUSEHOLDS ,ECONOMIC forecasting ,DEMOGRAPHY ,PROBABILITY theory ,SOCIOECONOMIC factors ,ECONOMICS - Abstract
In this paper a new method for the analysis of household formation and the composition of households is described. The components, or building blocks, which combine to form households are identified and these have been called `minimal household units' The focus of the analysis is on whether a minimal household unit sets up as a separate household or, if not, with whom it is shared. An economic theory of household formation is outlined, and a probit model is used to guide the estimation of the effects of economic and demographic characteristics of the minimal household unit on the probability of being a separate household, economic factors, such as the unit's income, and other social and demographic characteristics of the unit's members are shown to have a significant influence on the probability of its being a separate household. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1985
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
20. The Concept of Statistical Freedom and its Application to Social Mobility.
- Author
-
Gabor, André
- Subjects
SOCIAL mobility ,SOCIAL status ,SOCIAL groups ,SOCIOLOGY ,STATISTICS - Abstract
In their pioneer work "Social Mobility in Britain" the authors describe as one of their main objects "an assessment of the amount and direction of social mobility in Great Britain since the end of the nineteenth century." The authors define three points on the scale of intensity of association: "Complete association," which occurs when all sons have the same social status as their fathers; "perfect association," existing when all sons, whatever the status of their parents, have equal chance of reaching a given status category; and "complete dissociation," which occurs when all sons have a status different from their fathers. Neither perfect nor complete association are likely to occur in practice. Consequently, the authors of the symposium propose to assess and interpret social mobility with the aid of the three indices and the tests of significance based upon them. The conclusions reached in the symposium may be correct. They are, however, given no support by the heavy statistical framework, unless the authors choose to define association in terms of the index.
- Published
- 1955
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
21. Reply to the note by Neuman ‘Is fertility indeed related to religiosity?’
- Author
-
Alícia Adserà
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,Child rearing ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population ,Attendance ,Fertility ,International Social Survey Programme ,Christianity ,Religiosity ,Relevance (law) ,Sociology ,Social science ,education ,Social psychology ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
Neuman uses the rich information on religion contained in the International Social Survey Programme 1998: Religion II (ISSP 98) to estimate fertility equations similar to those in my paper. She concludes that current religiosity is not related to the number of children a woman has and that my findings are due to a misspecification of the religiosity measure. In this reply I argue that her results rely on the use of a group of women already selected for their attachment to the Catholic Church. I include new analyses with the ISSP 98 data-set to show that the positive relation between attendance at mass and fertility holds in a sample that includes those who have ever been baptized regardless of the background of their spouses. Further I explore an alternative measure of religiosity in the ISSP 98. Finally I make some clarifications of the findings in the paper and their relevance to the explanation of recent fertility changes in Spain. (excerpt)
- Published
- 2007
22. Bridal pregnancy in earlier rural England further examined
- Author
-
Paul E.H. Hair
- Subjects
History ,Baptism ,education.field_of_study ,Pregnancy ,Population ,Church discipline ,medicine.disease ,Genealogy ,Convention ,Argument ,Law ,medicine ,Sociology ,Relation (history of concept) ,education ,Demography - Abstract
This paper elaborates the argument of a previous paper (Population Studies, 20, 1966, pp. 233-43). The results of an investigation of the experience of 2,340 brides are broadly similar to those reported earlier: in particular, they confirm that bridal pregnancy was more common in the eighteenth than in the seventeenth century. Evidence is presented to suggest that the sixteenth-century experience was similar to that of the seventeenth, while the nineteenth-century experience was similar to that of the eighteenth. It is argued that bridal pregnancy was the product of a courting convention, rather than of 'betrothal-licence', and that it was not especially common among widows or teenagers. It is incidentally shown that the interval between birth and baptism was very brief in the sixteenth century, but lengthened in later centuries; and that the forbidden seasons for marriage were gradually eroded. Finally, it is suggested that the application of Church discipline in relation to bridal pregnancy could be assessed in the Church Court records.
- Published
- 2011
23. Why do people die in famines? Evidence from three island populations
- Author
-
Violetta Hionidou
- Subjects
Starvation ,History ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Geography ,Greece ,Public health ,History, 20th Century ,Hospital records ,Death ,Vital Statistics ,Death registration ,medicine ,Famine ,Sociology ,medicine.symptom ,Demography ,Cause of death - Abstract
There is surprisingly little consensus about what people die of during famines. In this paper, the causes of the increases in mortality during the Greek famine of 1941-43 are examined. The focus of the study is three island populations: Syros, Hios, and Mykonos. Death registration for these islands was not disrupted during the famine and the records give cause for death, certified by a doctor. Archival material and hospital records are utilized to assess public health during the famine. The findings point to the overwhelming importance of starvation for increased mortality during the famine and the virtual absence of either significant epidemics of infectious diseases or a breakdown in the public health system. The paper concludes by comparing the findings for the Greek famine with those for other famines. A model that attempts to explain the different courses that famine mortality can take is proposed.
- Published
- 2002
24. Historical demography: achievements and prospects
- Author
-
Osamu Saito
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,Scope (project management) ,Population ,Demographic transition ,Historical demography ,Historiography ,History, 20th Century ,Field (geography) ,Demographic analysis ,Plea ,Regional science ,Sociology ,Social science ,education ,Demography - Abstract
Historical demography as a separate discipline came into existence when family reconstruction was first developed for the analysis of a pre-transition population. This paper assesses the significant achievements made in this field of population studies since then. Attention is also paid to equally significant findings obtained from aggregative analysis based on back projection, and to a large body of research results for the period of the demographic transition. In the last part of the paper, new research directions are discussed. Data issues as well as methodological ones are raised. Special attention is given to newly emerging Asian historical demography where different source materials require different methods and techniques, which in turn are expected to broaden the scope of the so far disproportionality fertility-oriented field. Finally, discussions are extended to economic, cultural and institutional aspects of the subject, with a plea not to isolate demographic analysis from other branches of historical research.
- Published
- 1996
25. Reproductive transitions and women's status in Indian households
- Author
-
Megan N. Reed
- Subjects
Freedom of movement ,History ,Family Characteristics ,050204 development studies ,05 social sciences ,Decision Making ,India ,Mothers ,Context (language use) ,Contraception ,Sterilization (medicine) ,Women's empowerment ,0502 economics and business ,Social position ,Life course approach ,Humans ,Women's Rights ,Demographic economics ,Female ,Sociology ,050207 economics ,Centrality ,Demography ,Panel data - Abstract
Using panel data, this study tracks the impact of reproductive transitions on women's status in the household in India. Here, status refers to the social benefits that women experience by meeting societal expectations related to childbearing. The analysis shows that becoming a mother is associated with increased freedom of movement and access to enabling resources. The adoption of permanent contraception-a common life course event marking the end of childbearing in India-is associated with increased freedom of movement but has no association with changes in access to enabling resources. Household decision-making, another dimension of women's status examined in the paper, is less dynamic over time and there is limited evidence of its association with reproductive transitions. The findings illustrate the tight linkages between household power dynamics and the life course in the South Asian context, and highlight the centrality of women's role as mothers in determining their social position.
- Published
- 2021
26. Gender egalitarianism, perceived economic insecurity, and fertility intentions in Spain: A qualitative analysis
- Author
-
Mary C. Brinton and Xiana Bueno
- Subjects
Adult ,Employment ,Male ,History ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Sexism ,Fertility ,Intention ,Interviews as Topic ,Qualitative analysis ,5. Gender equality ,050602 political science & public administration ,Humans ,Sociology ,Low fertility ,10. No inequality ,Egalitarianism ,Demography ,media_common ,Valuation (finance) ,Gender equality ,Economic uncertainty ,05 social sciences ,16. Peace & justice ,0506 political science ,Socioeconomic Factors ,Spain ,050902 family studies ,Gender egalitarianism ,Obstacle ,8. Economic growth ,Female ,Demographic economics ,0509 other social sciences ,Perceived economic insecurity ,Fertility intentions - Abstract
This work was supported by the Horizon 2020Research and Innovation Framework Programmeunder the H2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie ActionsGrant Agreement No. 657030 to Xiana Bueno and by National Science Foundation grant #SES1123885 to Mary C. Brinton. Altres ajuts: NSF/SES1123885 Economic uncertainty contributes to low fertility in many European countries. On the other hand, greater gender equality may positively influence fertility. This paper examines how these two forces interact in Spain. We use in-depth interviews to analyse fertility decision-making among young and highly educated partnered adults living in urban areas. Highly gender-egalitarian interviewees are less likely to perceive economic insecurity as an obstacle to proceeding to a next birth than less egalitarian interviewees. But there is not necessarily a difference in these two groups' overall fertility intentions, as highly egalitarian interviewees' greater valuation of stable employment for both partners requires institutional and policy support for dual-earner couples' childrearing. When we look only at interviewees who express economic insecurity, somewhat higher fertility intentions are expressed by those holding less gender-egalitarian attitudes. Our results underline the complexity of the interrelationships between economic insecurity, gender egalitarianism, and fertility intentions.
- Published
- 2019
27. Otto Diederich Lütken--40 years before Malthus?
- Author
-
Arild Saether
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,Research methodology ,Denmark ,Population ,History, Modern 1601 ,Statistics as Topic ,Population Theory ,Malthusianism ,Knowledge sources ,Population growth ,Sociology ,Social science ,education ,Classics ,Demography - Abstract
In 1758, an article containing the view that resources limit population growth was published in Copenhagen. This paper gives a short presentation of the author Otto Diderich Lutken's life and literary production. His radical views on the question of population are given, and a comparison is made with the theories of Thomas Robert Malthus. A brief account of his views on other economic issues is also presented. The literature concerning his writings is reviewed. A discussion of who influenced him, and of his influence on others, ends this paper.
- Published
- 1993
28. The First Fifty Years--a Tribute to E. Grebenik.
- Author
-
Hobcraft, John
- Subjects
- *
DEMOGRAPHY , *DEMOGRAPHERS , *SOCIAL sciences , *PERIODICALS , *SOCIOLOGY , *PUBLICATIONS - Abstract
This paper attempts to define the field of demography, identify the demographer, assess the extent to which demography is a social science and relate it to the other social sciences. It examines how changes in the outside world affect what demographers do and what they publish. As befits Population Studies's 50th anniversary, the role of journals, and especially of this journal is examined. The early role of the journal and of its longtime two editors in defining the field is discussed. The interface between demography and the other social sciences is examined, as is the extent to which demographers publish in journals other than specialist population ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1996
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
29. Children’s educational attainment, occupation, and income and their parents’ mortality
- Author
-
Pekka Martikainen, Mikko Aaltonen, and Irma T. Elo
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,Parents ,History ,Article ,Young Adult ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Cause of Death ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Sociology ,Occupations ,Parental Death ,Child ,Socioeconomic status ,Finland ,Aged ,Demography ,Cancer mortality ,Academic Success ,030505 public health ,Cause specific mortality ,Middle Aged ,Educational attainment ,Social Class ,Income ,Adult Children ,Life course approach ,Female ,0305 other medical science ,Older people ,Lower mortality ,All cause mortality - Abstract
Using data from Finland, this paper contributes to a small but growing body of research regarding adult children's education, occupation, and income and their parents' mortality at ages 50+ in 1970-2007. Higher levels of children's education are associated with 30-36 per cent lower parental mortality at ages 50-75, controlling for parents' education, occupation, and income. This association is fully mediated by children's occupation and income, except for cancer mortality. Having at least one child educated in healthcare is associated with 11-16 per cent lower all-cause mortality at ages 50-75, an association that is largely driven by mortality from cardiovascular diseases. Children's higher white-collar occupation and higher income is associated with 39-46 per cent lower mortality in the fully adjusted models. At ages 75+, these associations are much smaller overall and children's schooling remains more strongly associated with mortality than children's occupation or income.
- Published
- 2017
30. The City in Late Imperial China (Book).
- Author
-
Dillon, Michael
- Subjects
SOCIOLOGY ,NONFICTION - Abstract
Reviews the book "The City in Late Imperial China," edited by G. William Skinner.
- Published
- 1978
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
31. The Importance of Economic Activity, Economic Potential and Economic Resources for the Timing of First Births in Norway.
- Author
-
Kravdal, Øystein
- Subjects
ECONOMIC indicators ,PARENTHOOD ,FERTILITY ,MOTHERHOOD ,RESEARCH - Abstract
This article studies the importance of economic activity, economic potential and economic resources for the timing of first births in Norway. Changes in the aggregate number of births are determined both by the quantum and tempo of fertility at the individual level. Previous research has identified a number of factors that seem to have a bearing on the timing of parenthood. Above all, the woman's education has generally been found to be a very important determinant of the timing of first births, as well as lifetime fertility. Its importance may even have increased during the last few decades. Recent German research has shown that the delayed first births among the better-educated are largely linked with continuing educational activity, whereas a higher educational level has no net inhibiting effect on first birth rates. Little is known about the impact of work experience on the timing of entry into motherhood. This is a subject of growing importance, because of the continuing high level of youth unemployment in much of the industrialized world. Results from previous empirical studies have been contradictory, and the few attempts that have been made to gain theoretical insight have not provided strong predictions.
- Published
- 1994
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
32. Teenage Marriage and Marital Breakdown : A Longitudinal Study.
- Author
-
Kiernan, Kathleen E.
- Subjects
TEENAGE marriage ,DIVORCE ,HUMAN fertility ,BIRTH control ,BIRTH intervals ,LONGITUDINAL method - Abstract
The risk of marriage breakdown for teenage brides is substantially greater than for women who marry later. From the life histories of a British cohort born in 1946, we show that teenage brides frequently come from less advantageous family backgrounds, have received less education and are in occupations of a lower status than those who marry later. Such pre-marital factors did not distinguish between teenage marriages that survived and those that broke down by the time the women were in their early thirties. Antecedent factors associated with higher risk of marital breakdown were marital breakdown in the family of origin and, more importantly, neuroticism score at age 16. Women whose marriages broke down were less stable, even before they married, than those whose marriages remained intact. Conditions after marriage also distinguish broken marriages from surviving marriages. Women with short first birth intervals and greater numbers of children were more frequently found in the group with broken marriages. Additionally, buying one's own home and higher incomes appear to be constraints on marriage breakdown. Generally, the results suggest that the factors which have a more direct bearing on marriage breakdown are conditions after marriage and latent characteristics such as personality type. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1986
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
33. Gregory King, Robert Malthus and the Origins of English Social Realism.
- Author
-
Laslett, Peter
- Subjects
SOCIAL realism ,SOCIAL perception ,SOCIAL scientists ,CONSERVATISM - Abstract
This article presents information on social realism and the contribution of social scientists Gregory King and Robert Malthus. Social opacity is not itself a simple phenomenon. Several element; can be discerned within it, often only partially distinct from each other. There is, as we have just seen, the unwillingness to recognize what is already known, or the desire to overlook it. There is the deliberate decision not to meddle with certain topics which could be explored. There are the barriers to knowledge set up by those who have an interest in perpetuating ignorance, and class influences of other kinds. There are ideological obstacles to the discovery and communication of information coming from established beliefs and assumptions, cultural and often specifically religious. In addition the means of discovery, record and communication may be lacking, and simple inertia, or conservatism may stand in the way of their introduction, indeed in the way of admitting any new thing. In the two centuries which included the lifetimes of King and Malthus all these influences and circumstances must have interfered with social perception and social structural exploration. But the factors mentioned later in our list must presumably have been more formidable then than they have been since.
- Published
- 1985
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
34. The Canadian Sample for Labour Force and other Population Data.
- Author
-
Keyfitz, N. and Robinson, H. L.
- Subjects
POPULATION ,SOCIOLOGY ,DEMOGRAPHIC surveys ,STATISTICS ,CENSUS ,DEMOGRAPHY - Abstract
The article focuses on the Canadian sample for labour force and other population data. The collection of statistical data by sampling rather than by supposedly complete enumeration is today a liberating force in all-quantitative work. Its advantages in the study of problems of population are especially great and are rapidly becoming apparent in several broad directions. Apart from the registration of births and deaths, which is important from a civil as well as from a statistical point of view, most of the population data in the past have in fact been obtained from the compilations of the census taker. Censuses have usually been separated by 10 or at least 5-year periods, the long interval between the time to which the data refer and the time at which they are released, often give them an interest which is largely historical, the questions tend of necessity to be confined to a more or less familiar set, suggested variations or additions to which must all too often be rejected as unwieldy or too expensive. With sampling, on the other hand, surveys can be carried out on a smaller scale, and hence more flexibly, the field is wide open for experimentation with new questions which are both more detailed and more meaningful than those which can be included in a census.
- Published
- 1949
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
35. Age at Marriage and Marital Fertility.
- Author
-
Clark, Colin
- Subjects
MARRIAGE ,POPULATION ,HUMAN ecology ,SOCIOLOGY ,FERTILITY ,REPRODUCTION - Abstract
This article focuses on age at marriage and marital fertility. The erratic behaviour of gross and net reproduction rates during the last ten years, in nearly every country for which they are available, has led to some suspicion of them as the best possible measurement of the trend of reproductivity. Suspicion gives place to systematic and penetrating criticism in researcher J. Hajnal's article in the September 1947 issue of Population Studies. The article shows the weakness of gross and net reproduction rates, as hitherto calculated, not only during war years, but also in any period of marked change. It is not possible to give a comprehensive bibliography of what is now a rapidly growing literature on the subject of marital fertility. The essence of the technique is to collect fertility data specific not for the age of woman but also for the duration of marriage. By summing such a series researchers can measure the reproductivity of a typical marriage, or of a population in which the numbers and durations of marriages are given by any required assumption.
- Published
- 1949
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
36. Some Estimates of the Reliability of Survey Data on Family Planning.
- Author
-
Westoff, Charles F., Potter Jr., Robert G., and Sagi, Philip C.
- Subjects
SURVEYS ,BIRTH control ,SEXUAL health ,POPULATION ,ECONOMICS ,HUMAN ecology ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
As a result of the growing concern over rapid population growth in the world, more studies are being made of the practice of family limitation. Generally, such studies rely on the technique of survey research. However, far too little information exists about the reliability of responses about family planning as collected by the interview. In connection, this article is concerned with another type of reliability, namely, the consistency of responses given by the same respondents asked identical questions at two different times. And in relation with the Family Growth in Metropolitan America study, a longitudinal survey being conducted by the Office of Population Research of Princeton University, a sample of Indian mothers is initially interviewed shortly after a second birth and then re-interviewed three years later.
- Published
- 1961
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
37. Fertility, Social Mobility and Urban Migration in Brazil.
- Author
-
Hutchinson, Bertram
- Subjects
FERTILITY ,REPRODUCTION ,SOCIAL mobility ,EMIGRATION & immigration ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This article seeks to explore fertility, social mobility and urban migration in Brazil. In the course of a sample survey of the adult population of eight cities in south-central Brazil conducted in 1959 and early 1960, material was obtained respecting total family size after ten or more years of marriage. This was analyzed in order to determine what variations in mean family size could be observed in relation to class status and social mobility. The results show that fertility is inversely related to class status, and that for a given class, the lower the class of origin, the higher the fertility. A tentative estimate suggests that the net effect of social mobility had been to reduce the sample's total births by something of the order of 3 per cent.
- Published
- 1961
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
38. Fertility and Social Mobility Among Teacher?
- Author
-
Scott, Wolf
- Subjects
SOCIAL mobility ,FERTILITY ,EDUCATION ,SOCIAL groups ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This article deliberates on the relationship between social mobility and fertility in teachers. R. A. Fisher in 1930 attributed the decline of ancient civilizations to the promotion to the ruling class of people who owed their mobility to relative infertility. Their failure to reproduce themselves caused the disintegration of their respective empires. Pre-war studies of the interrelationship between social mobility and fertility were either theoretical or, if actual data were collected, referred to limited populations. The more general application after 1940 of large scale sampling methods to human populations resulted in a series of field studies of the problem. Some of these provided direct evidence while others threw light on the association of both social mobility and fertility with common variables such as education. In 1955, material was collected at the Institute of Education, University of London, to study the social characteristics of teachers in grant-earning schools in England and Wales. The study provided data on both family of origin and procreation of a social group well known for the proportion of upwardly mobile persons it contains. Only minor adjustments were needed to render the data suitable for studying the relationship between fertility and social mobility of this group.
- Published
- 1958
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
39. The Facts of Life.
- Author
-
Stern, C.
- Subjects
REPRODUCTION ,HEREDITY ,SUPERSTITION ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
This article presents information about the book "The Facts of Life," by C.D. Darling. The facts in this book are the complex processes of reproduction and heredity. Its theme is that all aspects of life are bound up with these processes and with the notions which people have about them. Its motive power is the author's conviction that an appreciation of modern knowledge in these areas is lacking among those who deal with "the great problems of society-- of education, of medicine, of crime and punishment, of marriage and divorce, of the relations of races and classes and, taking a long view, of evolution." He is convinced that, instead, ancient and modern superstitions dominate sociological thought; and that, therefore, a need exists to tell men the facts mentioned in the book. More than one half of the book is given to a history of thought and experiment on reproduction, evolution and heredity. In the second large section of the book, "Man and Woman," the main intention of the author is fulfilled. It is asserted that genetic determination of man for the totality of his traits is the basic fact of life. "Heredity does determine the hormone system, and the hormone system does control growths temperament and intelligence."
- Published
- 1954
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
40. Adequacy of Existing Census Statistics for Basic Demographic Research.
- Author
-
Durand, John D.
- Subjects
POPULATION ,DEMOGRAPHIC surveys ,CENSUS ,STATISTICS ,SEX differences (Biology) ,SOCIOLOGY - Abstract
Present knowledge of population characteristics and trends in many parts of the world is seriously defective, when compared with the minimum needs for even the most elementary demographic analysis. The deficiencies are especially serious in the countries of Africa and Asia, and to a lesser extent in those of Latin America. Very many of the countries in these regions have had either no population census at all in recent decades, or only censuses known to be grossly deficient in coverage. Only a few of them have census data on sex and age of the population which can meet mild tests of accuracy and of sufficiency for analytical studies. Yet in these regions the census is almost universally the only source of information about population trends, for statistics of births and deaths are usually either totally lacking or too incomplete for use in this connexion. The population censuses which are being taken in 1950 or planned in 1951 for a great many countries will undoubtedly make an important improvement in this situation. But the extent of the improvement, with reference to the statistically backward regions, may be disappointing unless greater care is taken in these censuses than in previous ones to obtain data which are accurate enough, broad enough in coverage and tabulated in enough detail to satisfy the most important needs for analysis. Such methods as careful verification in selected sample areas of the completeness of enumeration and accuracy of returns, especially on such important subjects as sex and age of the people, would ensure the maximum product of usable statistics. The need for such improvement is shown in this article by an analysis of the census statistics obtained in each country having 1,000,000 or more population between 1919 and 1949. Tables are presented showing the availability of essential data on population size, growth and structure with reference to sex and age groups for each country, together with the results of simple tests of the completeness and accuracy of the data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 1950
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
41. The components of population change in nineteenth-century South-east Asia: Village data from the Philippines
- Author
-
Shui-Meng Ng and P. C. Smith
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,Economic growth ,Demographic history ,Population ,Historical demography ,Demographic transition ,Demographic analysis ,Economy ,Demographic change ,Population growth ,Sociology ,education ,Demographic statistics ,Demography - Abstract
Most analysis of contemporary demographic patterns in developing countries suffers from the lack of any useful basis for historical comparison- from the absence of contextual information regarding the movements of the same variables at earlier points in time. And since modern analyses of fertility trends in developing countries almost always describe a period late in the process of rapid economic change, relative to the encroachment of the global economic system on indigenous economies (which in many instances began as early as the nineteenth century), we are often without true baseline information on indigenous demographic processes. The importance of pushing time series of demographic observation backward into the past has been demonstrated amply by the work of the last several decades in European historical demography. The simple concept of the demographic transition has been revised, enriched, and finally transformed into useful behavioural models by painstaking historical reconstruction of individual histories at the local level.1 But despite these advances, the range of cultures and subsistence systems on which our theories of demographic change rest remains extremely narrow outside of the rich body of European and Japanese aggregative and reconstitution studies. There is a real need for historical demographic reconstruction at both aggregate and micro-levels in additional non-western settings. This paper is derived from a continuing research programme in Philippine historical demography that has three long-term goals: to establish a comparative basis for studies of contemporary demographic changes in the Philippines; to answer certain questions of particular interest in the setting of colonial and post-colonial South-east Asia; and to diversify the empirical base of demographic transition theory. Our focus is on the interpretation of aggregate patterns and trends for one rural Philippine locality during the nineteenth century - the pueblo of Nagcarlan. Data from Nagcarlan and similar data for the province and colony surrounding it are juxtaposed, as is limited information from elsewhere in the South-east Asian region. This allows us to sketch the prevailing demography of the region and the place of Nagcarlan as a community-level microcosm of that demographic regime. Only aggregate results are presented in this paper; our micro-level findings will be presented separately. Since a community-level reconstruction of population change has never been attempted with the data explored here, we are concerned equally with the substance of the demographic regime during the nineteenth century and with the adequacy of the data base for describing it. At several points in the analysis more than one method of estimation is used in order to establish the plausibility and consistency of the results. * Peter C. Smith is a Research Associate at the East-West Population Institute, Honolulu, Hawaii. Shui-Meng
- Published
- 1982
42. A note on the origin of the net reproduction ratio
- Author
-
F. M. M. Lewes
- Subjects
education.field_of_study ,History ,Present method ,Reproduction (economics) ,Research methodology ,Population ,Ever Married ,Sociology ,Age-Specific Fertility Rate ,education ,Genealogy ,Demography - Abstract
Summary When popularizing the net reproduction ratio during the 1930s Kuczynski attributed its origin to a paper by Richard Boeckh presented in Berlin in 1890. The present article suggests that while Boeckh provides a ratio, his working is not clear and in any case the purpose of his paper was very different. However, the present method of estimating the N.R.R. was used in a paper by William Farr ten years earlier, although he, too, failed to grasp its importance.
- Published
- 1984
43. The Americanization of catholic reproductive ideals
- Author
-
Judith Blake
- Subjects
History ,Ideal (set theory) ,Americanization ,Gender studies ,Sociology ,Roman Catholics ,Demography - Abstract
This paper considers the attitude of Roman Catholics in the United States of America towards family size and suggests that large family ideals are still being put forward by the Church in publications and periodicals. The second part of the paper considers the attitudes of American Roman Catholics towards family size and shows that though there are indications that Roman Catholics regard slightly larger families as ideal than do members of other religions, the difference is not now very great.
- Published
- 1966
44. The population controversy in eighteenth-century England. Part I. the background
- Author
-
D. V. Glass
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population ,Population decline ,State (polity) ,Law ,Economic history ,Sociology ,education ,Demographic statistics ,Period (music) ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
Summary This is the first of a series of papers which will endeavour to survey the development of British demography in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and to discuss the problems involved in studying population movements during that period. In the present paper an account is given of the background of the population controversy of the eighteenth century, with particular reference to the state of knowledge at the time of population movements, the contemporary views on the question of population decline in various European countries, and the specific proposals made in England and Wales for the improvement of demographic statistics.
- Published
- 1952
45. A survey of Indian immigration to British tropical colonies to 1910
- Author
-
I. M. Cumpston
- Subjects
History ,Economic growth ,Government ,education.field_of_study ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Immigration ,Population ,Developing country ,Colonialism ,Emigration ,Service (economics) ,Sociology ,Settlement (litigation) ,education ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
After the abolition of slavery in British colonies in 1834, many thousand labourers left India under indenture for employment on colonial plantations. Their efforts resulted in a striking rise in exports of plantation products. At the end of their indenture, many Indians decided to settle in their new home, especially in British Guiana, Trinidad, Mauritius and Fiji. The paper discusses the districts in India from which labourers were recruited ; the conditions of service under the indenture system, and its advantages and abuses. It discusses the opportunities open to the Indian labourer at the end of his indenture, and the facilities which the government or the planters provided for his settlement on the land. Those who did not settle on the land turned to the professions or trades, often with success. The paper discusses the attitude of the “communities of reception” to the Indian during and after indenture, and his adjustment to a multi-racial society. It analyses his change in outlook as a res...
- Published
- 1956
46. The birth statistics of Massachusetts during the Nineteenth Century
- Author
-
Robert Gutman
- Subjects
History ,education.field_of_study ,Younger age ,media_common.quotation_subject ,As is ,Population ,Fertility ,Degree (music) ,New England States ,State (polity) ,Statistics ,Sociology ,education ,Period (music) ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
of the population in the younger age groups is reliable. Spengler's results can be called into question because, as the author himself admits, he had no way of estimating the degree of under-registration of births in the States which he studied. The present paper is a report of an investigation which goes part of the way in surmounting the obstacles to our understanding of the trend of American fertility during the nineteenth century by trying to consider the very difficulty which one of these studies, that of Spengler, was forced to ignore. The difficulty referred to is the degree of under-registration of births in the statistics collected by States. Spengler did try to take this question into account, as is noted below, but the method he used to answer it failed to produce meaningful results. It should also be pointed out that whereas Spengler was concerned with all six New England States, our study is concerned only with the birth statistics of Massachusetts, which was the first State to inaugurate a registration system and whose birth records are generally considered to comprise the most reliable American statistics of the last century (Table i). The investigation covered the years between i842, when the system was established, and I90I, making a 6o-year period extending through the century. The paper describes in general terms the methods used in the investigation and the conclusions derived from their application. A few specific illustrations of the application of the methods are described in an appendix.
- Published
- 1956
47. Gender in population research: Confusing implications for health policy
- Author
-
Alaka Malwade Basu
- Subjects
History ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Tying ,Interpretation (philosophy) ,Public administration ,Health equity ,Presentation ,Sociology ,Ideology ,Positive economics ,Research question ,Health policy ,Legitimacy ,Demography ,media_common - Abstract
In this paper I discuss some of the health policy implications of an increasing trend in population research and in its interpretation and presentation - a trend to 'political correctness' - defined not in the popular, often derogatory, sense, but as an ideological commitment to certain principles. For one of these commitments, that to the notion of gender equality, greater strength and legitimacy is today commonly sought by tying it to other less controversial goals such as that of better health. But straining for connections between gender equality and positive health outcomes often unduly constrains the research question, the research methods, and the interpretation of the research. When health policy seeks guidance from this research, it can receive signals which are too often incomplete, silent on the many trade-offs of specific policy measures, and, ultimately, perhaps even detrimental to the very goals of gender equity and social justice from which they are derived. Examples of all these possibilities are discussed.
- Published
- 2017
48. Trends in cohabitation and implications for children s family contexts in the United States
- Author
-
Hsien-Hen Lu and Larry L. Bumpass
- Subjects
Family disruption ,History ,Cohabitation ,social sciences ,Sociology ,behavioral disciplines and activities ,Demography ,Immediate family - Abstract
This paper documents increasing cohabitation in the United States, and the implications of this trend for the family lives of children. The stability of marriage-like relationships (including marriage and cohabitation) has decreased despite a constant divorce rate. Children increasingly live in cohabiting families either as a result of being born to cohabiting parents or of their mother s entry into a cohabiting union. The proportion of births to unmarried women born into cohabiting families increased from 29 to 39 per cent in the period 1980-84 to 1990-94, accounting for almost all of the increase in unmarried childbearing. As a consequence, about two-fifths of all children spend some time in a cohabiting family, and the greater instability of families begun by cohabitation means that children are also more likely to experience family disruption. Estimates from multi-state life tables indicate the extent to which the family lives of children are spent increasingly in cohabiting families and decreasingly in married families.
- Published
- 2017
49. American political affiliation, 2003–43: A cohort component projection
- Author
-
Vegard Skirbekk, Eric P. Kaufmann, and Anne Goujon
- Subjects
Male ,History ,Time Factors ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Immigration ,Emigrants and Immigrants ,Fertility ,Cohort Studies ,Politics ,Politics of the United States ,Development economics ,Humans ,Sociology ,Demography ,media_common ,Political Systems ,Data Collection ,polsoc ,Age Factors ,Allegiance ,United States ,Demographic analysis ,Projections of population growth ,Political economy ,Female ,Political demography - Abstract
The recent rise and stability in American party identification has focused interest on the long-term dynamics of party bases. Liberal commentators cite immigration and youth as forces which will produce a natural Democratic advantage in the future while conservative writers highlight the importance of high Republican fertility in securing Republican growth. These concerns foreground the neglect of demography within political science. This paper addresses this omission by conducting the first ever cohort component projection of American partisan populations to 2043 based on survey and census data. A number of scenarios are modeled, but, on current trends, we predict that American partisanship will shift much less than the nation’s ethnic composition because the parties’ age structures are similar. Still, our projections find that the Democrats gain two to three percentage points from the Republicans by 2043, mainly through immigration, though Republican fertility may redress the balance in the very long term.
- Published
- 2012
50. Subreplacement fertility in the West before the baby boom: Past and current perspectives
- Author
-
Jan Van Bavel, Social Research, and Interface Demography
- Subjects
Warfare ,History ,Emancipation ,Secularism ,Social Values ,Second Demographic Transition ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population Dynamics ,Demographic transition ,Fertility ,Modernization theory ,below-replacement fertility ,demographic transition ,Development economics ,Secularization ,Humans ,Sociology ,Contraception Behavior ,Demography ,media_common ,Baby boom ,interwar ,Consumerism ,Historical demography ,History, 20th Century ,Europe ,Economic Recession ,Western World - Abstract
Between 1920 and 1940, fertility dropped below the replacement level in many western countries. In today's scholarly literature, this is routinely explained as a temporary reaction to the exceptional conditions of the interwar period. This paper confronts this view with the interpretations by interwar scholars. According to leading demographers of the time, low fertility was not due to war or economic crisis. They rather attributed it to processes that now tend to be associated with the Second Demographic Transition, including secularization, individualization, rising consumerism, and women's emancipation. Since these were seen as structural tenets of modernization, most scholars expected that fertility would stay below the replacement line for an extended period of time and could decline even further. They did not expect that the demographic parameters were heading for a new equilibrium with replacement level fertility.
- Published
- 2010
Discovery Service for Jio Institute Digital Library
For full access to our library's resources, please sign in.