How personal crises and instability impact women’s decisions to have children – evidence from 5 countries
All of us experience stressful or sometimes threatening circumstances in our lives. However, some people experience more severe adversities, for example related to their health, the health of their children, and/or their financial situation and job security. FutuRes and others define resilience as the ability to cope and adapt to such situations successfully.
In this paper, we expanded on the research of our FutuRes team at the SGH Warsaw School of Economics to look at how individuals’ childbearing decisions relate to their experiences of adversity and crises. Specifically, we aimed to investigate the association between life-course disturbances (negative shocks or adversities) experienced throughout women’s lives with the number of children they have or intend to have in the near future. We looked at the data on women who have experienced the following crises or adversities: having had children with disability, and/or who have faced job instability and financial problems.
In cases where such shocks were negatively correlated with having a child or intending to have a child, we checked whether having access to more resources (which we refer to as “resilience markers” in our research) meant that women had or intended to have children more frequently than women who experienced shocks but without “resilience markers”. For example, we verified whether having more favourable housing tenure, higher human capital (signified by having tertiary education) or better health, changed the association between experiencing a negative shock and having no or few children, or not planning to have another child soon.
How do women's experiences of crises impact their decisions to have childen?
Our analysis, which used data from the Generations and Gender Survey, included five countries (Austria, Czechia, Denmark, Finland and the United Kingdom). The findings suggest that experiencing health difficulties and unstable employment was indeed correlated with lower fertility. However, having financial difficulties (defined as having problems to make ends meet) was positively associated with having a higher number of children. We interpret this difference in reference to our definition of “experiencing a crisis or adversity” – as having financial difficulties likely does not constitute a significant deciding factor for people if they face other obstacles in their lives apart from financial ones. Likewise, we did not find that having more financial resources is positively associated with women’s subsequent decisions to have children. In regard to women with tertiary education, we found job insecurity was actually associated with a lower probability of having at least one or more than three children. Therefore, we can say that women with tertiary education adapt their fertility behaviour to labour market circumstances more than less educated women.
Our research identifies several other factors that influence women’s decisions to have children (or not). We found that women who have changed partners in the past are generally less likely to remain childless, suggesting that re-partnering offers increased chances of having children, regardless of whether they already have children from previous relationships. In line with the literature, religiosity emerges as the most influential and consistent factor linked to higher fertility, especially when it comes to the likelihood of having three or more children. One’s housing situation also plays a role, with renters generally more likely to be childless than homeowners, although the UK is an exception, whereby people renting public housing were more likely to have larger families.
In summary, this research provides evidence that experiencing crises or adversity influences women's decisions regarding childbearing, although the impact varies depending on the type of challenge and other contextual factors. A better understanding of how people make fertility decisions can inform policies that support individuals in realising their reproductive intentions. Our findings suggest that policies aimed at mitigating negative shocks related to women's and children's health, as well as women's financial and labour market situations, may be critical, especially for highly educated women.
