RESUMO

PIP: This study seeks to answer 2 questions: are there developing countries whose decline in fertility was rapid but then decelerated greatly or stopped totally; and if there are, what would cause such fertility declines to falter. Although the number of developing countries which have experienced such a stall for at least 5 years at a level well above replacement, and for which quality data are available, is limited, it is possible to study 3 such countries: Costa Rica, Korea, and Sri Lanka. In all 3, the total fertility rate (TFR) began a sustained rapid decline during the 1960s (though in Sri Lanka the decline may have begun during the 1950s). These declines began to stall around 1975. Korea experienced such a pause earlier, and is the only one of the 3 countries in which 2 stalls occurred. While the TFR leveled off during the late 1970s in Costa Rica and Sri Lanka, it continued to fall in Korea, but at a much slower pace than during the previous declines. The stalls which began in the late 1970s had not ended as of the most recent years for which data were available (1980-82). The explanations of the stalls are partial and differ for the 3 countries. In Costa Rica, the fall of marital fertility and increase in contraceptive use slowed, apparently as a result of convergence between desired and actual fertility in the mid-1970s and a weakening of the family planning program, as the initial enthusiasm and political support waned. It is likely that a further decline in fertility awaits a decline in desired family size. If desired size were to fall substantially below the level of the late 1970s, then the status of the family planning program would be relevant. In Korea, at least some of the reasons for the near leveling off of the TFR during the late 1960s seems to be evident, but the explanation for the deceleration after 1975 is unclear. During the earlier period, an increase in marriage among women 30-49 years old, as well as an increase in marital fertility of those under age 30, offset declines in marriage among women 15-29 years old and in the marital fertility of women age 30-49. The rise in the marital fertility of younger women is accounted for by a sharp decrease in the first 3 birth intervals, resulting from increases in premaritally conceived 1st births (associated with a shift from arranged to romantic marriages), declines in the duration of breastfeeding, and an apparently growing desire to terminate childbearing early. The increase in contraceptive use slowed markedly during the late 1960s. By the late 1970s, childbearing had become so concentrated that almost half of the TFR was accounted for by the birthrate of women aged 25-29, and about 2/3 by women age 25-34. The increase in contraceptive use decelerated during the late 1970s and early 1980s, after the acceleration of the early 1970s. The reasons for these changes have not been identified. The explanation for the fertility stall during the late 1970s in Sri Lanka is quite limited. A large increase in contraceptive use occurred between 1975-82. Surveys indicate that at least some of the fertility depressing effect of this contraceptive use increase was offset by an increase in marriage.^ieng

Assuntos

Coeficiente de Natalidade , Comportamento Contraceptivo , Demografia , Fertilidade , Dinâmica Populacional , Projetos de Pesquisa , Comportamento Sexual , América , Ásia , América Central , Anticoncepção , Costa Rica , Países Desenvolvidos , Países em Desenvolvimento , Características da Família , Serviços de Planejamento Familiar , Ásia Oriental , Coreia (Geográfico) , América Latina , Casamento , América do Norte , População , Pesquisa , Fatores Socioeconômicos , Sri Lanka

RESUMO

Abstract In a review of census data for the periods 1945-54 and 1955-63, Burch discloses an increasing tendency for average household sizes to cluster at five to six members for developing nations, compared to three to four for developed nations.(1) Also, among developing nations he finds less than 50% of the population living in households containing three to six persons. This apparently contradicts Levy's general rule which prompted his study, that 'for well over 50% of the members of ... all known societies in world history' actual family size and composition have varied much less than would be expected, given ideal rules of residence which can vary from the classical extended family of Asian renown and European history to the small 'isolated' nuclear family of the modernized West.(2).

Assuntos

Emprego , Fertilidade , Adolescente , Adulto , Fatores Etários , Escolaridade , Características da Família , Feminino , Guatemala , Humanos , Recém-Nascido , Idade Materna , Pessoa de Meia-Idade , Modelos Teóricos , Ocupações , Gravidez , Estudos de Amostragem , Fatores Socioeconômicos , Estatística como Assunto , População Urbana

RESUMO

In the past, one of the concomitants of development has been a sustained reduction in fertility. As a result of this experience, demographers hypothesize that in a society in which fertility is lower in urban areas, among the upper socioeconomic status groups and the better-educated, fertility will decline to a moderate level as the country changes from a rural, agricultural socioeconomic structure, with low levels of living and education, to an urban, industrial structure, with rising levels of living and education.The data analyzed in this study indicate, however, that though substantial social and economic development (as measured by changes in industrial structure, per capita income, urbanization, and education) occurred in Brazil from at least 1920-40 to 1960, during which time fertility differentials of the kind indicated above existed, fertility has shown little or no tendency to decline. Between 1940 and 1960, in fact, the birth rate appears to have remained fairly constant around 43. With the death rate steadily dropping, the rate of natural increase and population growth (given a small net in-migration) has been accelerating. p ]From a theoretical point of view, these facts reinforce a growing realization, based on similar findings in some other developing countries, that the prevailing theoretical ideas concerning the relationship between development and fertility require modification, particularly in the direction of greater specificity. On the practical side, the question is raised whether Brazil's rate of economic development during the postwar period up to 1960 can be maintained, let alone increased, in the face of a population growth rate which will probably average 3.2-3.5 percent for the period 1960-70 and which, in the absence of a decline in fertility, is likely to accelerate further.