Sarah R. Hayford

The Evolution of Fertility Expectations Over the Life Course

In low-fertility contexts, how many children people have is largely a product of how many children they want. However, the social, institutional, and individual factors that influence how many children people want are not well understood. In particular, there is scant evidence about how fertility expectations change over the life course. This article provides an empirical description of changes in womens expected fertility over the entire span of childbearing years. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 cohort, group-based trajectory analysis illuminates common patterns in the evolution of fertility intentions and identifies individual characteristics associated with these patterns. Factors related to family formation, such as marriage and whether a woman has a child at an early age, are found to be the most consistent correlates of patterns of change in expected family size.

The quality of retrospective data on Cohabitation

We assess the quality of retrospective data on cohabitation by comparing data collected in four major U.S. family surveys: the National Survey of Families and Households and three rounds of the National Survey of Family Growth. We use event-history analysis to analyze rates of entry into cohabitation in age-period-cohort segments captured by multiple surveys. We find consistent discrepancies among the four surveys. The pattern of differences suggests that cohabitation histories underestimate cohabitation rates in distant periods relative to rates estimated closer to the date of survey. We conclude with cautions regarding the use of retrospective data on cohabitation.

PMTCT, HAART, and Childbearing in Mozambique: An Institutional Perspective

Maternal and Child Health (MCH) units, where VCT/PMTCT/HAART have been integrated with traditional services, play a critical role in the connection between the massive HAART rollout and reproductive behavior. In this article, we use data from semi-structured interviews with MCH workers and ethnographic observations carried out in southern Mozambique to explore this role from the institutional perspective. We find that, along with logistical and workload problems, the de facto segregation of PMTCT/HAART clients within the “integrated” MCH system and the simplistic and uncompromising message discouraging further fertility and stressing condom-based contraception may pose serious challenges to a successful formulation and implementation of reproductive goals among seropositive clients. Although the recency of PMTCT/HAART services may partly explain these challenges, we argue that they are due largely to cultural miscommunication between providers and clients. We show how the cultural gap between the two is bridged by community activists and peer interactions among clients.

Understanding the Complexity of Ambivalence Toward Pregnancy: Does It Predict Inconsistent Use of Contraception?

Ambivalence towards future pregnancy is common and may increase the risk of unprotected sex and unintended pregnancy. We propose that ambivalent attitudes toward pregnancy consist of subtypes that are differentially associated with contraceptive use. Using data from a nationally representative survey of unmarried young adults (N = 1,147), we constructed four categories of ambivalence based on attitudes toward a hypothetical pregnancy. Multivariate analyses examined characteristics of ambivalence and the association between ambivalence and contraceptive use. Approximately one third of sexually active unmarried young adults are ambivalent about pregnancy. Having positive ambivalence (important to avoid a pregnancy but would be happy if it occurred) is associated with age, gender, education, and Hispanic origin. Although ambivalence toward pregnancy is associated with lower contraceptive use, this is true only among women with negative ambivalence (not important to avoid a pregnancy but would be unhappy if a pregnancy occurred). Attitudes toward pregnancy are multifaceted, and a more nuanced understanding of women’s attitudes toward pregnancy can help target prevention programs and related policies for women at risk of unintended pregnancy.

Repeat Unintended, Unwanted and Seriously Mistimed Childbearing in the United States

CONTEXT The high level of unintended fertility in the United States is a serious public health issue. Whether unintended fertility occurs across the population or is concentrated among a subset of women who experience multiple unintended births is unclear. METHODS Data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth were used to determine levels of unintended, unwanted and seriously mistimed childbearing, and chi-square and t tests were used to identify group differences in these measures, in two cohorts of women (those born in 1958-1962 and those born in 1965-1969). Both births (by ages 33-37) and mothers were used as units of analysis. RESULTS The proportion of births identified as unintended was greater in the 1965-1969 cohort than in the earlier cohort (37% vs. 34%), largely because a higher proportion of births to women in the former cohort were unwanted. In both cohorts, more than a third of women (36-41%) reporting at least one unintended birth had had at least one more, and women reporting unintended or unwanted births had higher overall fertility than others. Levels of repeat unintended fertility were greatest among black women, and the proportion of blacks who reported two or more unwanted births was 94% higher in the 1965-1969 cohort than in the 1958-1962 cohort (19% vs. 10%). CONCLUSIONS Repeat unintended fertility is common, especially among black women, who may differ from other groups in their contraceptive and fertility decisions as well as in their access to and ability to afford family planning services.

Fertility Following an Unintended First Birth

Research on unintended fertility tends to focus on births as isolated events. This article expands previous research by examining the relationship between early unintended childbearing and subsequent fertility dynamics in the United States. Data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth show that 27.5% of mothers report an unintended first birth. We use event history methods to show that these women are significantly more likely than women with an intended first birth to have an unintended second birth than to have either no second birth or an intended second birth, net of sociodemographic characteristics. An unintended first birth also increases the risk of having an unintended third birth relative to no birth or an intended birth, independent of the intendedness of the second birth. We conclude that early unintended fertility is a strong signal of high risk for subsequent unintended fertility.

Marriage (still) matters: the contribution of demographic change to trends in childlessness in the United States.

Childlessness in the United States nearly doubled between 1980 and 2000. Other dramatic changes in the U.S. population also took place over this period—notably, women’s average educational attainment increased, and the proportion marrying declined—but the impact of these changes on childlessness has not been formally examined. In this article, I use data from the Current Population Survey Fertility Supplements (1995, 1998, 2004, 2008) and logistic regression and regression-based decomposition techniques to assess the contribution of changes in educational attainment, marriage behavior, and racial/ethnic composition on population levels of childlessness in the United States. Results show that increases in the proportion of women unmarried by age 40 contributed most to the increase in childlessness in the late twentieth century, although these increases were offset somewhat by increased childbearing among unmarried women. The rising proportion of women with a college degree also explained a substantial amount of the increase in childless women.

Single Mothers, Single Fathers: Gender Differences in Fertility After a Nonmarital Birth

Research on nonmarital fertility has focused almost exclusively on unmarried mothers, due in part to a lack of fertility information for men. Cycle 6 of the National Survey of Family Growth allows exploration of nonmarital fertility for both genders.The authors compare the characteristics of unmarried first-time mothers (n = 2,455) and fathers (n = 797), use event history techniques to model second-birth hazards, and examine the distribution of men’s and women’s second births across types of relationships. The authors’ analysis is motivated by questions about how selection into nonmarital fertility relates to subsequent fertility behavior and by theories of mate selection and the “relationship” market. The authors found that unmarried mothers are more likely to have a second birth than unmarried fathers, driven largely by a higher hazard of having a noncoresidential second birth.

Fertility and the Stability of Cohabiting Unions Variation by Intendedness

An extensive body of research demonstrates that children increase the stability of marriage, but it is unclear whether the same is true for cohabitation. Marital stability theories often assume fertility is intended, which is less likely to be the case for cohabiting births. Using the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth, we find that intended and disagreed-upon pregnancies (but not unintended pregnancies) reduce the risk of dissolution relative to women who have no pregnancy or birth. Relative to nonfertile couples, all pregnancies increase the risk of marriage over staying cohabiting, but there is little difference in the odds of stability or transitions after birth. However, relative to an intended birth, having an unintended or disagreed-upon birth increases the risk of dissolution. These findings suggest that normative pressures influence the union behaviors of cohabitors during pregnancy, whereas selection processes and rational choice considerations play a greater role after a birth.

Bridging user and provider perspectives: Family planning access and utilization in rural Mozambique

To examine how the contraceptive behavior of women in rural southern Mozambique is shaped by their individual and household characteristics; community characteristics; access to family planning services; and characteristics of health facilities.