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Family influence in fertility: A longitudinal analysis of sibling correlations in first birth risk and completed fertility among Swedish men and women

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  • Johan Dahlberg

    (Stockholms Universitet)

Abstract

Background: The intergenerational transmission of fertility has received much attention in demography. This has been done by estimating the correlation between parents’ and offsprings’ fertility. An alternative method that provides a more comprehensive account of the role of family background - sibling correlations - has not been used before. Objective: I estimate the overall importance of family background on entry into parenthood and completed fertility and whether it changed over time. Furthermore, I compare the intergenerational correlation in completed fertility with corresponding sibling correlations. Methods: Brother and sister correlations in first birth hazard and in final family size were estimated using multi-level event-history and multi-level linear regression on Swedish longitudinal register data. Results: The overall variation in fertility that can be explained by family of origin is approximately 15%-25% for women and 10%-15% for men. The overall importance of the family of origin has not changed over the approximately twenty birth cohorts that were studied (1940-63 for women, 1940-58 for men). Parents’ completed fertility accounts for only a small share of the total family background effect on completed fertility. Conclusions: This study contributes to the existing understanding of intergenerational transition of fertility, both methodologically, by introducing a new and powerful method to study the overall importance of family of origin, and substantially, by estimating the overall importance of family of origin and ist development over time. A non-negligible proportion of the variation in fertility can be attributed to family of origin and this effect has remained stable over twenty birth cohorts.

Suggested Citation

  • Johan Dahlberg, 2013. "Family influence in fertility: A longitudinal analysis of sibling correlations in first birth risk and completed fertility among Swedish men and women," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 29(9), pages 233-246.
    • Handle: RePEc:dem:demres:v:29:y:2013:i:9
    DOI: 10.4054/DemRes.2013.29.9
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    Cited by:

    1. Eschelbach Martina, 2015. "Family Culture and Fertility Outcomes – Evidence from American Siblings," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 235(3), pages 246-267, June.
    2. Kathrin Morosow & Martin Kolk, 2020. "How Does Birth Order and Number of Siblings Affect Fertility? A Within-Family Comparison Using Swedish Register Data," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(2), pages 197-233, April.
    3. Clark, Gregory & Cummins, Neil, 2016. "The Child Quality-Quantity Tradeoff, England, 1780-1880: A Fundamental Component of the Economic Theory of Growth is Missing," CEPR Discussion Papers 11232, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Kathrin Morosow & Heike Trappe, 2018. "Intergenerational transmission of fertility timing in Germany," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 38(46), pages 1389-1422.
    5. Eva Beaujouan & Anne Solaz, 2019. "Is the Family Size of Parents and Children Still Related? Revisiting the Cross-Generational Relationship Over the Last Century," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(2), pages 595-619, April.
    6. Requena, Miguel & Reher, David Sven, 2023. "Intergenerational transmission of fertility in Spain among cohorts born during the first half of twentieth century," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    7. Ea Hoppe Blaabæk & Mads Meier Jæger & Joseph Molitoris, 2020. "Family Size and Educational Attainment: Cousins, Contexts, and Compensation," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(3), pages 575-600, July.
    8. Kieron J. Barclay & Mikko Myrskylä, 2016. "Parental age and offspring mortality: negative effects of reproductive aging are outweighed by secular increases in longevity," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2016-011, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    9. Johan Dahlberg, 2015. "Social Background and Becoming a Parent in Sweden: A Register-Based Study of the Effect of Social Background on Childbearing in Sweden," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 31(4), pages 417-444, October.
    10. Martin Kolk, 2015. "The causal effect of an additional sibling on completed fertility: An estimation of intergenerational fertility correlations by looking at siblings of twins," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 32(51), pages 1409-1420.
    11. Eva Beaujouan & Anne Solaz, 2016. "Are family sizes of parents and children still related? Revisiting the cross-generationalrelationship over the last century," Working Papers 223, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED).
    12. Johan Dahlberg & Martin Kolk, 2018. "Explaining Swedish sibling similarity in fertility: Parental fertility behavior vs. social background," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 39(32), pages 883-896.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    sibling correlation; family background; intergenerational transmission of fertility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

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

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