Karen Oppenheim Mason

Explaining fertility transitions

In this essay. I suggest that the crisis in our understanding of fertility transitions is more apparent than real. Although most existing theories of fertility transition have been partially or wholly discredited, this reflects a tendency to assume that all fertility transitions share one or two causes, to ignore mortality decline as a precondition for fertility decline, to assume that pretransitional fertility is wholly governed by social constraints rather than by individual decision-making. and to test ideas on a decadal time scale. I end the essay by suggesting a perceptual. interactive approach to explaining fertility transitions that is closely allied to existing theories but focuses on conditions that lead couples to switch from postnatal to prenatal controls on family size.

Gender and Family Change in Industrialized Countries

This volume focuses on the relationship between change in the family and change in the roles of women and men on contemporary industrial societies. Of central concern is whether change in gender roles has fuelled - or is merely historically coincident with - such changes in the family as rising divorce rates, increases in out-of-wedlock childbearing, declining marriage rates, and a growing disconnection between the lives of men and children. Covering more that twenty countries, including the USA, the countries of western Europe, and Japan, each essay in the volume is organized around an important theoretical or policy question; all offer new data analyses, and several offer prescriptions of how to fashion more equitable and humane family and gender systems. The second demographic transition and microeconomic theory of marital exchange are the dominant theoretical models considered; several chapters feature state-of-the-art quantitative analyses of large scale surveys.

Husbands’ versus wives’ fertility goals and use of contraception: The influence of gender context in five Asian countries

Using data from Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines, we explore how gender context influences (1) husband-wife concordance in the demand for children and (2) the impact of each spouse’s fertility preferences on contraceptive use. We also explore whether the husband’s pronatalism can explain the wife’s unmet need for contraception. The results suggest that gender context has little net effect on couples’ concordance, but influences the relative weight of husbands’ and wives’ preferences in determining contraceptive use. Analysis of women’s unmet need for contraception suggests that the husbands’ pronatalism contributes to wives’ unmet need, but only to a relatively small degree, especially in settings where unmet need is high. This is the case because the proportion of couples with differing fertility goals is small in most communities.

Differences between Women's and Men's Reproductive Goals in Developing Countries

Clearer understanding of the impact of gender on reproductive decision making is important for the formulation of family planning policy in developing countries. In general gender differences in fertilty goals are most likely to be found in highly patriarchal low-income high-fertility lineage-dominated societies in which formal schooling is relatively uncommon. It is unclear however whether men or women are likely to be more pronatalist in such settings. The physical costs to women of bearing children their responsibility for the day-to-day care of children and mens control over most of the resources could result in higher family size desires on the part of men in patriarchal societies. On the other hand womens economic vulnerability in these societies and the dominance of the maternal role could make women more favorable to higher fertility than men. Under relatively modern gender-equal conditions there is most likely to be a similarity of mens and womens fertility goals. A review of available empirical research on gender factors suggests 4 generalizations: 1) there is considerable variation in the relative fertility goals of the sexes across countries and studies; 2) the area of greatest gender asymmetry is the extent to which sons are preferred over daughters; 3) mens tendency to strongly prefer sons may account for their weak tendency to desire additional children more than women do; and 4) more often than not mens and womens fertility goals are the same.

The perceived impact of child care costs on women’s labor supply and fertility

In a sample of Detroit-area mothers of preschool-aged children interviewed in 1986, one-third reported that child care problems had constrained their employment. Such reports were relatively prevalent among poor women. those without relatives nearby, and those willing to entrust the care of their children to nonfamily members. Only one-tenth of the sample reported a similar child care constraint on fertility, a phenomenon unrelated to income but relatively prevalent among women with strong labor force attachment. The results suggest that policies to increase the supply of child care or to lower its cost could increase female labor supply by a substantial fraction, with an even greater rise among women most at risk of poverty and reliance on public assistance, but probably would not raise fertility significantly.

Determinants of Child Care Ideals among Mothers of Preschool-Aged Children.

This paper explores the extent to which care by a childs parents is considered ideal at different preschool ages using data collected in 1986 for a probability sample of 1302 mothers of preschool-aged children living in the greater Detroit metropolitan area. Womens current use of child care marital and employment status income youngest childs age gender role ideology religion religiosity education race proximity to relatives and place of residence are all hypothesized to affect child care ideals. The data show that a majority of women view parental care as ideal at all preschool-ages with almost 1/3 taking this stance even when the childs mother is working. The strongest correlates of preferring parental care are living with a husband or male partner being out of the labor force espousing a traditional gender role ideology and attending religious services frequently. Income religion education and proximity to relatives are unrelated to child care ideals. The results are interpreted to indicate that child care ideals are not simply rationalizations for womens present circumstances but rather are part of a broader ideology of family and gender that reflects womens adult experiences. (authors)

Market Child Care Versus Care by Relatives Choices Made by Employed and Nonemployed Mothers

We study the determinants of whether mothers of preschool-aged children use market child care versus care by relatives to assess the importance of economics versus preferences. The evidence suggests that employed mothers turn to relatives for child care partly out of preference, not just because relatives are inexpensive. Public policies that encourage the use of relatives for child care might therefore increase parental satisfaction and quality of care. The analysis finds substantially similar results for African American and other women, but the results for employed mothers differ from those for nonemployed women, who appear to use child care primarily to enhance child development.