Childless Expectations and Childlessness Over the Life Course

Area of Science:

• Sociology
• Demography
• Reproductive Health

Background:

• Childlessness is often viewed as a fixed choice, yet women's fertility intentions can evolve.
• Understanding the pathways to and experiences of childlessness is crucial for reproductive health research.

Purpose of the Study:

• To analyze women's evolving childless expectations and fertility behaviors using longitudinal data.
• To identify distinct life course trajectories associated with childlessness.
• To examine the predictive power of childless expectations on actual childlessness.

Main Methods:

• Utilized nineteen panels of the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY-79).
• Constructed life-lines to track women's childless expectations and fertility behavior over time.
• Employed longitudinal logistic regression to analyze the relationship between expectations and outcomes.

Main Results:

• One-quarter of women reported childless expectations, but only 14.8% remained childless.
• Identified two main paths to childlessness: delayed childbearing and indecision about parenthood.
• Over 10% of women had children after previously considering childlessness.
• Childless expectations, despite variability, were strong predictors of permanent childlessness.

Conclusions:

• Assigning fixed labels of expected or unexpected childlessness is problematic.
• Childbearing postponement is a key factor influencing both childless expectations and outcomes.
• Socio-demographic and situational factors primarily affect childless expectations through childbearing postponement.