IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/dem/wpaper/wp-2001-015.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Regional social contexts and individual fertility decisions: a multilevel analysis of first and second births in Western Germany

Author

Listed:
  • Karsten Hank

    (Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany)

Abstract

In this paper, a multilevel approach is used to investigate whether and how regional social contexts influence first and second birth probabilities of women living in western Germany during the 1980s and 1990s. In the theoretical part it is argued that regional opportunity structures as well as local patterns of social interaction and culture may translate into parameters that directly affect individual behaviour. Individual level data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) are then linked with a set of regional indicators to estimate multilevel discrete-time logit models for the transition to the first and second child. The empirical analysis provides no evidence that the distinct fertility differences observed at the regional level are due to autonomous contextual effects. It is rather suggested that most of the observed regional variation may be due to differences in the spatial distribution of individual characteristics. (AUTHOR)

Suggested Citation

  • Karsten Hank, 2001. "Regional social contexts and individual fertility decisions: a multilevel analysis of first and second births in Western Germany," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2001-015, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:dem:wpaper:wp-2001-015
    DOI: 10.4054/MPIDR-WP-2001-015
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.demogr.mpg.de/Papers/Working/wp-2001-015.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.4054/MPIDR-WP-2001-015?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ross Stolzenberg & Linda Waite, 1984. "Local labor markets, children and labor force participation of wives," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 21(2), pages 157-170, May.
    2. Karsten Hank & Michaela R. Kreyenfeld, 2000. "Does the availability of childcare influence the employment of mothers? Findings from western Germany," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2000-003, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    3. William N. Evans & Wallace E. Oates & Robert M. Schwab & William N. Evans & Wallace E. Oates & Robert M. Schwab, 2004. "Measuring Peer Group Effects: A Study of Teenage Behavior," Chapters, in: Environmental Policy and Fiscal Federalism, chapter 13, pages 232-257, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Charles F. Manski, 1993. "Identification of Endogenous Social Effects: The Reflection Problem," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 60(3), pages 531-542.
    5. repec:cai:popine:popu_p1998_10n1_0071 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Donna Ginther & Robert Haveman & Barbara Wolfe, 2000. "Neighborhood Attributes as Determinants of Children's Outcomes: How Robust Are the Relationships?," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 35(4), pages 603-642.
    7. Karsten Hank & Michaela R. Kreyenfeld, 2001. "Childcare and fertility in (western) Germany," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2001-019, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    8. Francesco C. Billari & Hans-Peter Kohler, 2000. "The impact of union formation dynamics on first births in West Germany and Italy: are there signs of convergence?," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2000-008, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    9. Moulton, Brent R, 1990. "An Illustration of a Pitfall in Estimating the Effects of Aggregate Variables on Micro Unit," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(2), pages 334-338, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Iyer, S. & Weeks, M., 2004. "Multiple Social Interaction and Reproductive Externalities: An Investigation of Fertility Behaviour in Kenya," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0461, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    2. Iyer, S. & Weeks, M., 2009. "Social Interactions, Ethnicity and Fertility in Kenya," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 0903, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    3. Karsten Hank & Michaela R. Kreyenfeld, 2001. "Childcare and fertility in (western) Germany," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2001-019, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Karsten Hank, 2002. "Regional Social Contexts and Individual Fertility Decisions: A Multilevel Analysis of First and Second Births in Western Germany," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 18(3), pages 281-299, September.
    2. Karsten Hank, 2002. "Regional Social Contexts and Individual Fertility Decisions: A Multilevel Analysis of First and Second Births in Western Germany," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 270, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    3. Ben Jensen & Mark N. Harris, 2008. "Neighbourhood Measures: Quantifying the Effects of Neighbourhood Externalities," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 84(264), pages 68-81, March.
    4. Dujardin, Claire & Goffette-Nagot, Florence, 2010. "Neighborhood effects on unemployment?: A test à la Altonji," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(6), pages 380-396, November.
    5. Fertig, Michael, 2003. "Educational Production, Endogenous Peer Group Formation and Class Composition - Evidence From the PISA 2000 Study," RWI Discussion Papers 2, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung.
    6. Dominique Goux & Eric Maurin, 2007. "Close Neighbours Matter: Neighbourhood Effects on Early Performance at School," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 117(523), pages 1193-1215, October.
    7. Rhiannon Patterson, 2008. "Neighborhood Effects on High-School Drop-Out Rates and Teenage Childbearing: Tests for Non-Linearities, Race-Specific Effects, Interactions with Family Characteristics, and Endogenous Causation using ," Working Papers 08-12, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    8. Giulio Zanella, 2004. "Discrete Choice with Social Interactions and Endogenous Memberships," Department of Economics University of Siena 442, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    9. Bet Caeyers, 2014. "Peer effects in development programme awareness of vulnerable groups in rural Tanzania," CSAE Working Paper Series 2014-11, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    10. Patrick Bayer & Stephen L. Ross, 2006. "Identifying Individual and Group Effects in the Presence of Sorting: A Neighborhood Effects Application," Working papers 2006-13, University of Connecticut, Department of Economics, revised Jan 2009.
    11. Yakusheva, Olga & Kapinos, Kandice & Weiss, Marianne, 2011. "Peer effects and the Freshman 15: Evidence from a natural experiment," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 119-132, March.
    12. Florence Goffette-Nagot & Claire Dujardin, 2005. "Neighborhood effects, public housing and unemployment in France," Working Papers 0505, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    13. Maria De Paola & Vincenzo Scoppa, 2010. "Peer group effects on the academic performance of Italian students," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(17), pages 2203-2215.
    14. Firat Yaman, 2014. "Ethnic externalities in education and second-generation immigrants," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(34), pages 4205-4217, December.
    15. Blume,L.E. & Durlauf,S.N., 2005. "Identifying social interactions : a review," Working papers 12, Wisconsin Madison - Social Systems.
    16. Lee, Grace H.Y. & Lee, Sing Ping, 2014. "Childcare availability, fertility and female labor force participation in Japan," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 71-85.
    17. Robert Bifulco & Jason M. Fletcher & Stephen L. Ross, 2011. "The Effect of Classmate Characteristics on Post-secondary Outcomes: Evidence from the Add Health," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 3(1), pages 25-53, February.
    18. Bilger, Marcel & Carrieri, Vincenzo, 2013. "Health in the cities: When the neighborhood matters more than income," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 1-11.
    19. Deri, Catherine, 2005. "Social networks and health service utilization," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 1076-1107, November.
    20. Weili Ding & Steven F. Lehrer, 2007. "Do Peers Affect Student Achievement in China's Secondary Schools?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(2), pages 300-312, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Germany (Alte Bundesländer); fertility; geography;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics
    • Z0 - Other Special Topics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:dem:wpaper:wp-2001-015. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Wilhelm (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.demogr.mpg.de/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.