4.12 Fertility

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The Young Women surveys contain two types of information on fertility.  In most surveys, information is collected about each child living in the respondent’s household at the time of the interview. This information is found in the “Household Record” and includes the child’s age and relationship to the respondent.  Depending on the survey, the household record may also include the child’s date of birth, educational attainment, labor force status, and sex. For more information about data collected in the household record (also called the “Household Roster”), see the “Household Composition” section of this guide.

Household record information only provides a partial picture of each respondent’s fertility because it does not capture children given up for adoption, children who died, and children who reside outside the home.  To remedy this problem, a number of surveys have gathered additional information about each respondent’s fertility.  This information is quite complex, making construction of a fertility history for the Young Women more time-consuming than for other NLS cohorts.  Users will find small gaps in the collection of fertility data for respondents not consistently interviewed over time.  However, close examination of household record data for new children after survey gaps can help to ameliorate this limitation.

The first set of fertility questions was asked in 1973.  Respondents were asked how many children they had given birth to, how many more children they desired, and their opinion of the optimal family size.  The 1978 interview collected detailed fertility information about each of up to six children born to the respondent and about each of up to five adopted children or children from an earlier marriage of her husband.  Information available for each child includes sex, date of birth, life status, whether the child was still residing in the respondent’s home, and, if not, the month and year the child left the household.  While the adopted child roster covers the respondent’s entire life, the 1978 biological roster only asks about children born since 1973.

In 1983 the fertility and adoption rosters were repeated to include children born since January 1978.  Users should note that respondents who were noninterviews in 1978 do not provide information back to 1973, so these respondents would be missing fertility information for 1973–77.

Beginning in 1985, the roster format was dropped and respondents were asked the number of births since their last survey and the total number of children ever born.  For each child born since the last survey, the date of birth was recorded.  Respondents were also asked how many more children they expect to have overall and within the next five years.

In 1988, the fertility question format used in 1985 was repeated for births.  The section was expanded, however, by a roster for adopted and other children who came to live in the household.  This roster asked the name, sex, birth date, year they entered the household, life status, and date they left the household.  This roster was designed to capture all nonbiological children who had entered the household since January 1983.

In the 1991 and 1993 surveys, biological births were recorded using the format instituted in the 1985 survey; the 1993 survey additionally recorded the child’s sex.

Related Variables: The “Intrafamily Transfers” section, administered in 1999, collected information about transfers of time and money between respondents and their children. Some demographic data were gathered as part of this collection. For more information, interested users should refer to the “Transfers” section of this guide.

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