Search

The abstract is available here: https://uscholar.univie.ac.at/o:1669856

La famille, le couple, les relations entre générations revêtent aujourd’hui des réalités multiples. Y a-t-il de nouvelles formes de conjugalité ? Que signifie être en couple sans vivre ensemble ? Quelle influence la religion a-t-elle sur le mariage et les naissances ? Quelles sont les implications d’une séparation sur l’histoire familiale des enfants ? Le partage des tâches au sein du couple a-t-il changé ? Les grandes étapes du « passage à l’âge adulte » ont-elles évolué depuis 20 ans ? Désire-t-on un deuxième enfant dans les mêmes conditions que le premier ? Les relations entre parents et enfants adultes ont-elles changé ? Qui sont les grands-parents d’aujourd’hui ? Afin de rendre compte des nouveaux comportements démographiques en France, l’Ined et l’Insee ont interrogé 10 000 personnes, représentatives de la population en 2005 (Enquête Étude des relations familiales et intergénérationnelles). Parce que la famille n’en finit pas de se réinventer et que ces évolutions concernent ce qui nous touche le plus, ces témoignages, analysés ici par des sociologues, démographes, économistes et statisticiens, permettent de dresser différents « portraits de familles », représentatifs des évolutions en profondeur qui touchent nos sociétés depuis ces dernières décennies.

En France, les formes de vie conjugale se sont diversifiées depuis une quarantaine d’années. Le principal changement par son ampleur a été le développement des unions hors mariage à partir de 1972, d’abord comme mode d’entrée en union, puis comme forme d’union stable. Dès le début des années 1990, neuf couples sur dix se mettaient en ménage sans être mariés et, dix ans plus tard, la moitié des premières naissances avait lieu hors mariage. En 1999, le Pacte civil de solidarité (Pacs) a été cré...

Introduction Depuis les années 1970 en Europe, divorces et remariages se sont multipliés. Les deuxièmes divorces ayant, eux aussi, suivi cette tendance, des questions sur la stabilité des deuxièmes mariages ont émergé. Ainsi, les deuxièmes mariages sont-ils aussi fréquemment rompus que les premiers ? À quoi peut-on attribuer les différences éventuelles ? Au niveau individuel, les personnes ayant rompu un premier mariage vivent-elles un deuxième mariage plus fragile ou, au contraire, plus soli...

Introduction En France, alors que les séparations se sont multiplié depuis la fin des années 1960, le paysage des unions s’est transformé : développement de la cohabitation et des naissances hors mariage, multiplication des familles recomposées, etc. Les ruptures et les divorces en France ont été largement étudiés pendant cette période de changement (Baillon et al., 1981 ; Blayo et Festy, 1976 ; Desplanques, 1987 ; Toulemon, 1996). Les déterminants sociodémographiques et les suites de la sépa...

Introduction Rester sans enfant est de plus en plus commun en Europe. Dans certains pays comme l’Autriche, la Finlande ou le Royaume-Uni jusqu’à un cinquième des femmes pourraient ne pas avoir eu d’enfant au terme de leur vie féconde (Sardon, 2006). Diverses raisons de rester sans enfant peuvent être évoquées, qui incluent un aspect volontaire, mais aussi un aspect involontaire lié aux circonstances de la vie : problèmes de santé, infertilité, absence de conjoint ou conjoint avec lequel on ne...

Six ans après Portraits de familles, ce deuxième volet de l’Étude des relations familiales et intergénérationnelles (Érfi) retrace les parcours de vie des 10 000 personnes ayant participé à l’enquête. Que sont-elles devenues ? Se sont-elles mises en couple, se sont-elles séparées ? Ont-elles eu des enfants ? Quelle influence a eu leur parcours familial sur leur vie professionnelle, et réciproquement ? Dans quelle mesure les événements de vie activent l’entraide entre générations ? Constate-t-on des différences de comportements entre les hommes et les femmes ? L’interrogation successive, trois puis six ans après des mêmes personnes permet de mieux appréhender les parcours de vie et les comportements démographiques tant individuels que familiaux. Elle offre un éclairage sur les grandes tendances et les diversités des modes de vie face à certaines évènements de l’existence comme l’arrivée d’un enfant, le chômage, une séparation, un départ à la retraite. Ce panorama détaillé permet de saisir les transformations de la famille et de ce qu’elle recouvre aujourd’hui en France.

Family patterns in Western countries have substantially changed across the 1940 to 1990 birth cohorts. Adults born more recently enter more often unmarried cohabitations and marry later, if at all. They have children later and fewer of them; births take place in a non-marital union more often and, due to the declining stability of couple relationships, in more than one partnership. These changes have led to an increasing diversity in family life courses. In this paper, we present a microsimulation model of family life trajectories, which models the changing family patterns taking into account the complex interrelationships between childbearing and partnership processes. The microsimulation model is parameterized to retrospective data for women born since 1940 in Italy, Great Britain and two Nordic countries (Norway and Sweden), representing three significantly different cultural and institutional contexts of partnering and childbearing in Europe. Validation of the simulated family life courses against their real-world equivalents shows that the simulations not only closely replicate observed childbearing and partnership processes, but also give good predictions when compared to more recent fertility indicators. We conclude that the presented microsimulation model is suitable for exploring changing family dynamics and outline potential research questions and further applications.

Parenthood postponement has been a major component of the huge changes in fertility since the 1970s. We are seeking to understand whether the delay in childbearing contributed to lower aggregate fertility levels in Austria, through the study of late fertility intentions. Our study is based on the Austrian Micro-Censuses (1986-2016) and on the Austrian Generation and Gender Surveys (panel data 2008/09 and 2012/13). Across the female birth cohorts 1950 to 1979, the gap between intentions expressed at age 35-39 and actual cohort fertility kept growing. From that age, and particularly after age 40, women who wanted a child often wanted it as soon as possible or within one year. However, we showed that a strong wish to have children was unlikely to materialize at these late ages. Up to 70% of women who had expressed a certain and short-term intention at age 30-32 in 2008/09 had a child, but due to the deep age-related decrease almost no woman aged 42-45 had had a child by 2012/13. For men the decrease was less steep, from 60% in their 30s to 20% in their 40s. Also, strong intentions started changing massively to less certain or negative intentions when reaching the mid-30s. Partnership status was the main driver of realisation of strong intentions, while childless men and women intended a child late most often but changed their intention least often.

Delayed parenthood is a central feature of the massive transformation of family and reproduction in rich countries. We analyse the shift of motherhood towards later reproductive ages during the last four decades and review its consequences for children and their mothers in low-fertility countries in Europe, North America, Oceania and East Asia. First we analyse the trends in birth rates at advanced reproductive ages (35+), including trends at very high reproductive ages (50+) and detailing the rapid rise in first and second birth rates at that ages. We show that a relatively high share of childless women and of women with one child aged 35-44 still plan to have a(nother) child in the future. Subsequently, we discuss the limited success rates of assisted reproduction at advanced reproductive ages and its contribution to parenthood at later ages. Next we outline the key drivers of delayed parenthood and its demographic consequences. Finally, we briefly review the consequences of delayed motherhood for pregnancy outcomes, maternal and child health and highlight selected positive consequences of later parenthood for mothers and children. We argue that economic and social rationales for late reproduction clash with the biological and health rationales for having children earlier in life.

We study the aggregate gap between intended and actual fertility in 20 countries in Europe and the United States, adopting a cohort approach that differs from the period approach widely used in prior research. We compare the mean intended number of children and percentage intending to be childless among young women aged 25-29, measured during the 1990s, with the data on completed or almost completed fertility in the same cohorts later in life when they were aged 40 and older. In addition, we analyze the aggregate intentions-fertility gap among women with different educational attainment. Our exploration is informed by the cognitive-social model developed by Bachrach and Morgan (2013). The results reveal distinct regional patterns with regard to the completed fertility-intentions gap, most apparent for the childlessness gap. In addition, the gap is the largest among highly educated women in most studied countries and its educational gradient also varies by region.

During the last four decades, the two-child family ideal has become nearly universal across the low-fertility countries. The proportion of families with two children, which was growing during the baby boom, stopped increasing in the late 1940s and early 1950s birth cohorts, remaining far below the number of people reporting two as their ideal family size. This paper examines how changes in the share of two-child families were linked to trends in the transitions to first, second and third birth. We analyse how the relationship varied over time across countries and education levels using census and large-scale survey data for women born between 1936 and 1970 in 12 European countries, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. The results suggest that in most countries the changes in the share of two-child families were closely linked to the progression to third birth. Increasing childlessness also suppressed the number of two-child families in Western Germany and English-speaking countries. Changes in the transition to second birth played a nonnegligible role in Southern Europe, English-speaking countries and, except among the loweducated, in Central-Eastern Europe.

This study provides a systematic analysis of parity components of the cohort fertility decline in 32 low-fertility countries in Europe, North America, Australia and East Asia. We decompose the change in cohort fertility in each country among women born between 1940 and 1970 using parity progression ratios (PPR) derived mostly from census, register data, and large-scale surveys. We are also interested in how the effect of the changing parity progression ratios varied across broader regions and whether it was different in countries reaching very low completed fertility. The fall in fertility was mostly driven by reductions in the progression ratios to third and higher-order births in the first stage of 1940 to 1955 cohorts. Among women born between 1955 and 1970 fertility decline slowed down in most regions. This second stage of the cohort fertility decline analysed here is also distinguished by its regional diversity. The main distinction can be drawn between Central and Eastern Europe, where fertility decline was driven primarily by falling second birth rates and the German-speaking countries, Southern Europe, and East Asia, where the fall in first birth rates (and the corresponding rise in childlessness) had a stronger influence.

The paper uses a time series of repeated rounds of the General Household Survey in Great Britain to study uncertainty in fertility intentions. We show that a substantial minority of women are uncertain in their expectations about future childbearing. A comparison of reported uncertainty in GHS rounds 1979-1990 with 1991-2007 reveals that the estimated level of uncertainty is influenced by question format. At the individual level, uncertainty varies largely with demographic status and life stage-age, partnership status, parity and time since previous birth. Evidence from qualitative and quantitative studies, particularly in relation to pregnancy intentions, reinforces the reality of uncertainty about reproductive prospects. We suggest that the measurement of fertility intentions needs improvement. A new theoretical approach to fertility intentions is outlined in brief.

In France, the frequency of separation and repartnering is increasing. Do separations reduce fertility by preventing births? Or do they have the opposite effect, with second unions providing new opportunities for childbearing? To answer this question, Éva Beaujouan analyses two recent surveys by INED and INSEE: the French version of the Generation and Gender Survey (Étude des relations familiales etintergénérationnelles, Erfi) conducted in 2005, and the 1999 family history survey (Étude de l’histoire familiale, EHF).