First births by age and education in Britain, France and Norway

Progressively later starting of childbearing has been a feature of cohort change in fertility across Europe and elsewhere over recent decades. Growing differences in the age patterns of childbearing between the Anglo-American and continental European countries, however, have also been found. The present study uses large linked-record databases in Britain, France and Norway to analyse these differences in more detail, focussing on age at entry to motherhood (first childbearing) by level of educational attainment among women born in the 1950s and in the 1960s. The shift between these two cohorts towards a later pattern of first childbearing in Britain was confined to women with secondary school qualifications and above. For women born in the 1960s, the peak age for risk of first childbearing among those with secondary school qualifications grew to be between seven and eleven years later than among women without secondary school qualifications. In France and Norway, the peak ages for risk of first childbearing shifted more uniformly across education levels between the two cohorts. For these 1950s and 1960s cohorts, improvements in women's educational levels also occurred more uniformly in France and Norway, moving more women into education categories characterised by later patterns of first childbearing.     

Simultaneous care for parents and care for children among mid-life British women and men

This article investigates care provided to parents and parents-in-law by mid-life adults with dependent children at home. Data from the General Household Survey are used first to estimate the prevalence of this 'two-way' care over the past decade, and second to develop forecasts of two-way care for a generation of women who have just finished their childbearing years. Having a higher education qualification is associated with later ages both of caring for parents and of having children at home. Increasingly late first childbearing, however, points towards a potentially greater caring 'squeeze' for higher-qualified women, with a little over 1 in 10 at age 45 projected to be caring for a parent while still having a child under 18 in the household.     

Childbearing outside marriage in western Europe

Across most European states in recent decades there have been significant increases in childbearing outside marriage. This article examines the extent to which women have their first child in one of four settings: prior to any partnership; in their first cohabiting partnership; in first marriage; and after a first partnership. Temporal changes in these behaviours and variation according to background characteristics of the women are also examined. For the women who had a child outside any partnership, we examine the extent to which they go on to form partnerships and how long after the birth this happens. For those who had their first child within a cohabiting union, we examine the extent to which they marry and how long after the birth this occurs. Finally, we investigate whether children born within cohabiting unions that do and do not convert into marriages are more or less likely than those born within marriage to see their parents separate.     

Mothers with living children and children with living mothers: the role of fertility and mortality in the period 1911-2050

Whether an individual has one or more surviving children at a given age and/or a surviving parent depends both on fertility (not only number of children, but also timing of childbearing) and mortality. We consider the contribution of changes in mortality and fertility to past and likely future trends on availability of such kin. The proportion of people aged 60 with a mother alive will more than double between those born in 1911 and 1970, and the figure will increase for at least the next 30 years. While there are increasing concerns about the availability of informal care for elderly people from children in the next quarter century or so, in fact we conclude that a higher proportion of elderly people are likely to have a surviving child than for any generation ever born in Britain, and will have more than any foreseeable future cohort.     

How important are intergenerational cycles of teenage motherhood in England and Wales? A comparison with France

Teenage fertility has fallen substantially in every Western European country except the United Kingdom. This article examines the hypothesis that repetition of teenage motherhood from mother to daughter is a major cause of the UK being the exception. A simple demographic model of fertility across generations is estimated with comparable data from England and Wales and France. The main finding is that mother-daughter repetition can account for only a minor part of the total difference in teenage childbearing between the two countries, especially over the long term. The higher teenage childbearing in England and Wales of those whose mothers began childbearing after their teenage years dominates.     

Family building intentions in England and Wales: trends,outcomes and interpretations

This article presents and analyses women's childbearing intentions collected in the General Household Survey (GHS). Data from the 21 surveys from 1979 to 2001 show that over that period there has been a fall in women's intended numbers of births. However the latest data (from the 1998, 2000 and 2001 surveys) show that the average number of children intended is still around two, somewhat higher than the average number of children current fertility rates suggest women will have. The questions of whether this difference can be interpreted as possible unmet need for children, whether past intentions have been good predictors of fertility, and how current intentions may be used to inform projections assumptions are discussed. In relation to the last question, fertility intentions by ethnic group are also presented.     

Stability and change in fertility intentions in Britain, 1991-2007

The very low fertility experienced in several European countries in recent decades in the presence of higher intended family sizes has renewed interest in fertility intentions data. While the overall level of childbearing in Britain over the past few decades has remained relatively stable and high in comparison with many other European countries, we have seen sizeable increases in the age at which childbearing starts. This study uses data from the 1991 to 2007 General Household Surveys to examine trends in family intentions data in an attempt to arrive at a better understanding of these recent fertility developments. First, time trends in intended family size are compared with trends in observed fertility. Next, aggregate changes in intentions regarding the level and timing of fertility across the life course for cohorts are investigated together with the extent to which these aggregate intentions are matched by the subsequent childbearing of cohorts. Finally, both change across the life course and uncertainty in family intentions are examined. We conclude by discussing what these findings might tell us about contemporary reproductive decision making.     

Trends in fertility and contraception in the last quarter of the 20th century

The late 1960s and early 1970s saw major changes in access to birth control. This article reviews trends in fertility and contraception between 1976 when the Family Formation Survey was undertaken and 1998, the latest year for which data are available. There has been an increase in mean age at childbirth over the period. Some of this increase is possibly a result of childbearing in second and subsequent relationships when the women will be older on average. This also has had an impact on their patterns of contraception use. Teenage pregnancy is high on the Government's agenda. Teenage pregnancy continues at constant levels. As the estimated age of first intercourse decreases, there is a continued need for sufficient, accessible and appropriate family planning services.     

生产能力约束下的价格竞争与柔性进入决策研究

针对现有文献的缺陷,在给定生产能力的条件下,建立一个进入者决策的两阶段模型:第一阶段进入者进行柔性进入决策;第二阶段与在位者进行价格竞争.应用实物期权方法研究进入者的进入决策,给出柔性条件下的进入决策规则.结果表明,较高(低)的进入投资成本、风险较大(小)的市场和较高(低)的在位者生产能力将使得进入者推迟(提前)进入.     

Who reports address changes through the healthcare system? The characteristics of laggers and non-reporters using the Northern Ireland Longitudinal Study

Address information from health service professionals is already important for the delivery of health care and population monitoring and screening. It is also important for statistical purposes such as the estimation of migration and small area populations and its importance could increase as the decade progresses and alternatives are sought to the traditional census. Because of this, it is important to understand more about the accuracy of address information provided through the health care system.This article considers the characteristics of 'laggers' - those who delay in reporting address changes - and 'non-reporters' - those who on occasion fail to report their addresses.The article finds that, as might be expected, laggers and non-reporters tend to be male and resident in urban and deprived areas. However, less expectedly, older people tend to be laggers, as are owner occupiers, those who are not ill, those who have some educational qualifications, and those who are self-employed. Some non-reporters are also more likely to be employed in professional jobs and to be unmarried (for example single, remarried and divorced). This suggests that poor address information is not just a problem associated with the socially deprived and the young but also with some more affluent groups such as those not experiencing limiting long-term illness. The article concludes by arguing that the checking of patients' address information should be collected under the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) as a performance indicator.     

Perpetual postponers? Women's, men's and couple's fertility intentions and subsequent fertility behaviour

In this article data from the British Household Panel Study (BHPS) are used to analyse gender differences in fertility intentions, and the correspondence between fertility intentions and subsequent fertility behaviour. By exploiting couple-level data, we examine whether partners have conflicting preferences for future fertility. Focusing on women who remain childless in their thirties we look at socio-demographic factors related to the intention to remain childless, or to start a family later on in life. By following up women over time, the characteristics of women who go on to have a child later on in life are considered. The importance of having a partner and the fertility intention of that partner in predicting whether a birth will occur are also examined.     

Migration trends at older ages in England and Wales

Information on the behaviour and characteristics of our rapidly growing older population is of increasing importance to policy makers, who want to ensure a good quality of life for our elderly. This article uses data from the Office for National Statistics Longitudinal Study (1971-2001) to illustrate trends in migration at older ages. It shows how the propensity to migrate differs by age, sex, marital status, living arrangements, economic resources and health in later life, amongst people aged 50 and over in England and Wales. Results show that moves at older ages are associated with changes in health and living arrangements, but also that these associations are inter-related with other factors such as age.     

Migration in later life: evidence from the British Household Panel Study

This article uses data from the British Household Panel Study over the period 1991 - 2007 to examine the factors associated with residential mobility among people aged 50 and over. In line with earlier research, the likelihood of migrating, that is, changing address, is found to vary according to the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the older person. Those in late middle age (50-59) and the oldest-old (90 and over) were most likely to move. Migration was also strongly associated with changes in partnership, health and economic status during the last 12 months, highlighting the importance of seeing migration within a life course context with certain life course events such as divorce, widowhood or retirement being important triggers for prompting a move. As divorce and remarriage become more common in later life, 'relationship driven migration' is likely to become more important, adding a new category to the classical typology of later life migration.     

The Models of Childbearing System

1IntroductionThemechanismofhumanreproductionsystemhasbeenanactivesubjectforseveraldecades.Fertilitylevelisassociatedwithsocial,economic,andpsychologicalfactors.Theproximatedeternlinalltsoffertilityhavebeenoutlinedintothebiologicalandbehaviouralparametersw…     

The effect of changes in timing of childbearing on measuring fertility in England and Wales

Changes in the ages at which women give birth to their children mean that fertility measured at a particular point in time (period) may not be a good representation of the ultimate fertility of those women. The common measure of period fertility is the total fertility rate, which in 2001 has fallen to the lowest level since records began in England and Wales. This article presents various methods that have been proposed to adjust period fertility data to take account of changes in the timing of childbearing, applied to England and Wales data. The article concludes that while these adjustment methods provide useful insights, for example, that the total fertility rate has underestimated period quantum fertility since the 1970s, the measures produced are difficult to interpret. This is in part because the concept they are trying to measure, period quantum is itself imprecise. The adjustments do not necessarily provide a reliable indicator of underlying cohort fertility.     

Unmarried parenthood: new insights from the Millennium Cohort Study

This study uses information from the Millennium Cohort Study to examine the characteristics of families where children are born within a marriage, within a cohabiting union or outside of a co-residential partnership. For this latter group, for the first time in a national data set, an assessment can be made of the 'strength' of the parent's relationship at the time of the birth. We show that the context of childbearing varies with respect to geography, ethnicity, age, parity and educational status of the mother, and that the socioeconomic wellbeing of families varies according to the partnership status of their parents. A closer look at the non-partnered parents shows that the extent to which the fathers were involved with the mother of the child around the time the baby was born was related to the presence of the father at the birth of the child and whether his name was recorded on the child's birth certificate; as well as to subsequent behaviour, such as, whether they moved in with the mother, saw their children on a regular basis or contributed money to the child's maintenance.     

Local marriage markets in Great Britain: how diverse?

Estimates are made of the number of potential marriage partners available for unmarried men and women, by age, in Great Britain in 1991 and how this varies across local districts. The preferences of men and women in relation to partner ages are taken into account in the estimates. Average partner supply declines by age for women and increases with age for men. Marriage markets differ between local areas but the differentiation is not as substantial as in many other aspects of local demography and is a good deal less than the variation that occurs through time. Young women and older men have advantageous marriage markets almost everywhere while young men and older women are at a disadvantage in almost all areas.     

Change in living arrangements following death of a partner in England and Wales, 1971 to 2001

Understanding trends and changes in the circumstances of couples separated by death is important for policy initiatives to reduce vulnerabilities associated with end of life care and for those who live on. This article uses widow(er)hood statistics and census data from the Office for National Statistics Longitudinal Study. It examines changes in couples' living arrangements and households at four successive censuses from 1971 to 2001 and shows how these differ by age and gender on the death of a spouse or partner. Findings draw attention to the effects of ageing and mortality improvements as well as wider social and economic trends in family and household formation, residential independence in older age, and policy developments on long-term care provision for older people.     

Characteristics of sole registered births and the mothers who register them

This article explores the characteristics of live births where no father was present on the birth certificate (sole registrations) using registration data. It then uses data from the ONS Longitudinal Study to examine some characteristics of mothers who have ever experienced a sole registered live birth. It shows that as a proportion of all births, sole registrations have remained fairly constant over the last two decades, although since 1998 there is some evidence of a fall in the proportion. For mothers born between 1955 and 1962 around nine per cent experienced a sole registration. Those who ever experienced a sole registration were around four years younger when they began their childbearing. These women also had larger families and were more likely to come from a lower social class background.     

Aligning Academic Activities: Implications for Teaching and Research in a New Zealand Institute of Technology

A problem situation that is at the heart of a New Zealand higher education institute applying for university status is meeting the requirement for sufficient academic staff with postgraduate qualifications. For this particular New Zealand higher education institute that was originally a teaching institution offering only sub-degree qualifications, the move to firstly offering degrees and secondly seeking university status has meant that employment conditions have shifted for many academics. In order to explore the multiple world views on the impact to the whole system of a significant number of staff upgrading qualifications whilst engaged in full-time teaching at the same time, views were sought from senior executives, heads of schools, human resource personnel and staff engaged in their own postgraduate study. Multiple conceptual models have been utilised to gain an understanding of this problem situation: Soft Systems Methodology (Checkland and Scholes, 1990, 1999) in both its original and its current form; complexity theory (McKenna, 1999; Merry, 1995; Stacey, 1996) and context-dependent cluster model (CDCM) (Fielden and London, 2001). These multiple conceptual models have all contributed to providing a basis upon which to compare multiple-perceived worlds with appropriate conceptual models upon which to base a future action plan.Outcomes discussed are both positive and negative factors including: recognition, time, stress, employment contracts, senior staff expectations, family, collegial and institutional support and the integration of own study with teaching practice and content. Implications for alignment across institutional organisational levels and also for higher education outside of the university sector are also discussed.