The Intergenerational Transmission of Fertility
Social Institutions
Marriage and the Family
Abstract
The intergenerational transmission of fertility has direct consequences on population dynamics and is indirectly related to the reproduction of social inequality. Early studies focused on the positive correlation of parents and children fertility outcomes such as family size or childbearing timing. Explanations for the observed correlations have spanned from genetic and social status inheritance mechanisms to role modeling and socialization processes based on social learning and social influence. More recently, the focus has shifted from fertility outcomes to similarities and dissimilarities of family formation patterns across generations, framing fertility in the context of interrelated life course trajectories. Recent cutting-edge research has also expanded upon the existing literature by focusing on the role played by multigenerational relationships and by bidirectional influence processes in parents-children fertility behaviors. Challenges for future research are provided by the need to disentangle the interplay between genes and culture in defining tastes and preferences for given values and norms related to fertility and the increasing family complexity and migration that interfere with socialization processes.
References
- Amato, P. R. (1996). Explaining the intergenerational transmission of divorce. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 58, 628–640.
- Axinn, W., & Thornton, A. (1993). Mothers, children, and cohabitation: The intergenerational effects of attitudes and behavior. American Sociological Review, 58(2), 233–246.
- Bandura, A. (2006). Psychological modeling: Conflicting theories. New Brunswick, NJ: Aldine Publications.
- Barber, J. (2000). Intergenerational influences on the entry into parenthood: Mothers' preferences for family and nonfamily behavior. Social Forces, 79(1), 319–348.
- Barber, J. (2001). The intergenerational transmission of age at first birth among married and unmarried men and women. Social Science Research, 30(2), 219–247.
- Baykara-Krumme, H. (2015). Three-generation marriage patterns: New Insights from the “dissimilation” perspective. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 41(8), 1324–1346.
- Bengston, V. (2002). How families still matter: A longitudinal study of youth in two generations. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
- Bernardi, L., & White, R. (2010). Close kin influences on fertility behaviour. In P. Heady & M. Kohili (Eds.), Family, kinship and state in contemporary Europe (pp. 177–202). Frankfurt, Germany: Campus.
- Bernardi, L. (2003). Channels of social influence on reproduction. Population Research and Policy Review, 22, 527–555.
- Bernardi, L. (2013). From mothers to daughters: Intergenerational transmission of family norms. In A. L. Ellingsæter, A.-M. Jensen & M. Lie (Eds.), The social meaning of children (pp. 153–169). London, England: Routledge.
- Bernardi, L., & Oppo, A. (2008). Family configurations and fertility. In E. Widmer & R. Jallinoja (Eds.), Beyond the nuclear family: Families in a configurational perspective (pp. 175–202). Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang Editor.
-
Brannen, J. (2015). Fathers and sons: Generations, families and migration. London, England: Palgrave McMillan.
10.1057/9781137379672 Google Scholar
- Bras, H., van Bavel, J., & Mandemakers, K. (2013). Unraveling the intergenerational transmission of fertility: Genetic and shared-environment effects during the demographic transition in the Netherlands. The History of the Family. doi:10.1080/1081602X.2013.803491 (published online on the June 27).
- Bucx, F., Raaijmakers, Q., & Van Wel, F. (2010). Life course stage in young adulthood and intergenerational congruence in family attitudes. Journal of Marriage and Family, 72(1), 117–134.
- Buhr, P., & Huinink, J. (2015). The German low fertility: How we got there and what we can expect for the future. European Sociological Review, 31, 197–210.
- Campbell, E. Q. (1969). Adolescent socialization. In D. A. Goslin (Ed.), Handbook of socialization theory and research (pp. 821–859). Chicago: Rand-McNally.
- Carlson, M., & Meyer, D. (2014). Family complexity: Setting the context. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, 654(1), 6–11.
- Chan, T. W., & Boliver, V. (2014). Social mobility over three generations in Finland: A critique. European Sociological Review, 30(1), 13–17.
- De Valk, H. A. G., & Liefbroer, A. C. (2007). Timing preferences for women's family-life transitions: Intergenerational transmission among migrants and Dutch. Journal of Marriage and Family, 69(1), 190–206.
- Diekmann, A., & Engelhardt, H. (1999). The social inheritance of divorce: Effects of parent's family type in postwar Germany. American Sociological Review, 64(6), 783–793.
-
Elder, G. H., Jr. (2001). Life course: Sociological aspects. In N. J. Smelser & P. B. Baltes (Eds.), International encyclopedia of the social and behavioral sciences (Vol. 26, pp. 8817–8821). Oxford, England: Elsevier.
10.1016/B0-08-043076-7/02023-4 Google Scholar
- Fasang, A. E., & Raab, M. (2014). Beyond transmission: Intergenerational patterns of family formation in middle-class American families. Demography, 51, 1703–1728.
- Hagestad, G. O. (1985). Continuity and connectedness. In V. L. Bengtson & J. F. Robertson (Eds.), Grandparenthood (pp. 31–48). Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
- Kendler, K. S. (2001). Twin studies of psychiatric illness: An update. Archives of General Psychiatry, 58(11), 1005–1014.
- Knafo, A., & Spinath, F. M. (2011). Genetic and environmental influences on girls' and boys' gender-typed and gender-neutral values. Developmental Psychology, 47, 726–731.
- Kohler, H.-P., Rodgers, J. L., & Christensen, K. (1999). Is fertility behavior in our genes: Findings from a Danish twin study. Population and Development Review, 25(2), 253–288.
- Kolk, M. (2014). Multigenerational transmission of family size in contemporary Sweden. Population Studies, 68(1), 111–129.
- Liefbroer, A. C., & Elzinga, C. H. (2012). Intergenerational transmission of behavioral patterns: How similar are parents' and children's demographic trajectories? Advances in Life Course Research, 17(1), 1–10. doi:10.1016/j.alcr.2012.01.002.
- Lyngstad, T. H., & Prskawetz, A. (2010). Do siblings' fertility decisions influence each other? Demography, 47(4), 923–934.
- Mare, R. D., & Maralani, V. (2006). The intergenerational effects of changes in women's educational attainments. American Sociological Review, 71, 542–564.
- Miller, W. B. (1992). Personality traits and developmental experiences as antecedents of childbearing motivation. Demography, 29(2), 265–285.
- Moen, P., Erickson, M. A., & Dempster-McClain, D. (1997). Their mother's daughters? The intergenerational transmission of gender attitudes in a world of changing roles. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 5(1), 281–293.
- Murphy, M. (1999). Is the relationship between fertility of parents and children really weak? Social Biology, 46(1–2), 122–145.
- Murphy, M. J., & Knudsen, L. B. (2002). The intergenerational transmission of fertility in contemporary Denmark: The effects of number of siblings (full and half), birth order, and whether male or female. Population Studies, 56(3), 235–248. ISSN 0032-4728.
- Murphy, M., & Wang, D. (2002). The impact of intergenerationally-transmitted fertility and nuptiality on population dynamics in contemporary populations. In J. L. Rodgers & H.-P. Kohler (Eds.), Biodemography of human reproduction and fertility (pp. 209–228). Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
-
Pearson, K., Lee, A., & Bramley-Moore, L. (1899). Mathematical contributions to the theory of evolution. VI. Genetic (reproductive) selection: Inheritance of fertility in man, and of fecundity in thoroughbred racehorses. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series A, 192, 257–330.
10.1098/rsta.1899.0006 Google Scholar
- Risch, S. C., Jodl, K. M., & Eccles, J. S. (2004). Role of the father adolescent relationship in shaping adolescents' attitudes toward divorce. Journal of Marriage and Family, 66, 46–58.
- Rodgers, J. L., & Doughty, D. (2000). Genetic and environmental influences on fertility expectations and outcomes using NLSY kinship data. In J. L. Rodgers, D. C. Rowe & W. B. Miller (Eds.), Genetic influences on human fertility and sexuality (pp. 85–106). Boston, MA: Kluwer.
- Rodgers, J. L., Hughes, K., Kohler, H. P., Christensen, K., Doughty, D., Rowe, D. C., & Miller, W. B. (2001). Genetic influence helps explain variation in human fertility: Evidence from recent behavioral and molecular genetic studies. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 10(5), 184–188.
- Schermer, J. A., Feather, N. T., Gu, Z., & Martin, N. G. (2008). Phenotypic, genetic, and environmental properties of the portrait values questionnaire. Twin Research & Human Genetics, 11(5), 531–537.
-
Silverstein, M., & Giarrusso, R. (2011). Aging individuals, families, and societies: Micromeso-macro linkages in the life course. In R. A. Settersten & J. L. Angel (Eds.), Handbook of sociology of aging (pp. 35–49). New York, NY: Springer.
10.1007/978-1-4419-7374-0_3 Google Scholar
- Soiliou, S. D., & Roushdy, R. (2008). Intergenerational transmission of fertility preferences: A test of the cultural substitution assumption. Working papers 352, University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
- Tam, K.-P. (2015). Understanding intergenerational cultural transmission through the role of perceived norms. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 46, 1260–1266.
- Tambs, K., Sundet, J. M., Magnus, P., & Berg, K. (1989). Genetic and environmental contributions to the covariance between occupational status, educational attainment, and IQ: A study of twins. Behavior Genetics, 19, 209–222.
- Thomson, E. (2014). Family complexity in Europe. The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, 654(1), 245–258.
- Thornton, A. (1991). Influence of the marital history of parents on the marital and cohabitational experiences of children. American Journal of Sociology, 96(4), 868–894.
- Tropf, F. C., Stulp, G., Barban, N., Visscher, P. M., Yang, J., Snieder, H., & Mills, M. C. (2015). Human fertility, molecular genetics, and natural selection in modern societies. PloS One, 10(6), e0126821.
- Udry, J. R. (1996). Biosocial models of low-fertility societies. Population and Development Review, 22, 325–336.
- van Bavel, J., & Kok, J. (2009). Social control and the intergenerational transmission of the age at marriage, rural Holland 1850–1940. Population-E, 64(20), 343–360.
- van der Valk, I. E., Spruijt, I., de Goede, M., Larsen, H., & Meeus, W. (2008). Family traditionalism and family structure. Attitudes and intergenerational transmission of parents and adolescents. European Psychologist, 13(2), 83–95.
- van Poppel, F., Monden, C., & Mandemakers, K. (2008). Marriage timing over the generations. Human Nature, 19(1), 7–22.
- Warren, J. R., & Hauser, R. M. (1997). Social stratification across three generations: New evidence from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. American Sociological Review, 62, 561–572.
- Westphal, K., Poortman, A. R., & von der Lippe, T. (2015). What about the Grandparents? Children's postdivorce residence arrangements and contact with grandparents. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 77, 424–440.
- Williams, L. A., & Williams, B. J. (1974). A re-examination of the heritability of fertility in the British peerage. Biodemography and Social Biology, 21, 225–231.
Further Reading
- Bandura, A. (1976). Social learning theory. Prentice-Hall, NJ: Englewood-Cliffs.
Citing Literature
Browse other articles of this reference work:
