Personality and background predictors of a young wife's desired family size

A questionnaire that included 19 personality, socioeconomic, and general background variables was administered to 160 childless Caucasian, Protestant wives of college students to discover variables that offered promise as predictors of desired family size. Of the samples, 66% wanted two children, and 14% wanted three children. Four variables--feelings of alienation, father's social class level, level of overt anxiety, and childhood family size--had a combined multiple correlation of .39 with desired family size in a stepwise regression analysis and accounted for almost 15% of the desired family size variance. Results suggest that although desired family size remains difficult to predict, personality factors may be as significant as socioeconomic factors in its prediction.