Population Studies-A Journal of Demography最新文献

The sense of belonging to the current neighbourhood may play a role in the transition to parenthood by indicating a feeling of being 'at home' and having access to social resources. However, previous research has indicated that individuals often move house in anticipation of parenthood, likely altering their connection to the neighbourhood in the process. With data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study (2009-23) and using logit regression, we examine the likelihood of a first birth. The results reveal that individuals with a higher sense of belonging to their neighbourhood are more likely to have a first child: especially recent movers compared with long-term residents. Furthermore, while long-distance movers generally show a lower probability of becoming parents, those with a high sense of belonging are as likely as short-distance movers to become parents. These findings suggest that socio-spatial factors play a role in the transition to parenthood.

Evidence shows that immigrants are often in better health than the native born-the so-called 'immigrant health paradox'-and this advantage may extend to their children's health. A commonly cited but rarely tested explanation is the 'selectivity hypothesis', positing that immigrants are healthier due to selection at origin based on health or socio-economic status (SES). Using 2007-19 Spanish birth registries, we investigate immigrant-native gaps in health at birth and whether they are explained by immigrants' educational selectivity. We find that babies born to immigrants are less likely to be low birthweight (LBW) but are disadvantaged in terms of macrosomia and gestational age. Selectivity is associated with reduced LBW even after accounting for parental SES, explaining the lower risk among children of Northern African and Latin American immigrants but not across other parental country-of-birth groups. Selectivity is not associated with other birth outcomes. We confirm the selectivity hypothesis but question its universality across groups and health outcomes.

In the context of low fertility and population ageing, many countries look to immigration to address labour shortages and reduce the effects of population decline. While the short-term effects of immigration are relatively well understood, the long-term demographic consequences of high and sustained immigration are still undetermined. In this paper, we highlight the major contributions that immigration has made to population change across 11 geographic areas in Australia from 1981 to 2021. The analyses use recently reconciled demographic component data for 18 overseas-born subgroups and the Australia-born population by age and sex. While net international migration of overseas-born people contributed approximately 56 per cent of overall population growth over the 40-year period, immigrants also made sizeable contributions to other demographic processes: 28 per cent of births, 31 per cent of deaths, and 17 per cent of interregional migration. This research provides new insights into both period-specific and long-term demographic effects of diverse immigration streams across Australia's cities and regions.

This study investigated educational differences in parity distribution at separation. Using the Harmonized Histories and GGS-II data sets, we examined unions ending in separation in 1995-2004 and in 2011-20 across 12 countries in Europe and North America, comparing them with a matched group of intact unions. Our analysis revealed a negative educational gradient in parity at separation. The mean number of children at separation decreased with higher levels of parental education in 10 out of 12 countries in the earlier observation window and four out of six countries in the later observation window. This educational gradient was more pronounced in unions ending in separation than intact unions and also in the earlier observation window. Overall, our findings show that couples with low and medium education contribute disproportionately to the population of children experiencing parental separation, corroborating concerns raised by previous studies on the social stratification of separation.

Italy has witnessed increases in life expectancy and population ageing, raising concerns about their impact on population health. Disability status greatly affects the participation of mid-to-older-aged adults in various aspects of life. We examine the long-term trend in disability-free life expectancy (DFLE) in Italy, over three different periods between 2004 and 2019, and explore disability dynamics (onset and recovery) and changes in disability-specific mortality. We use IT-SILC longitudinal data to estimate transition probabilities and DFLE between ages 50 and 79 and decompose DFLE changes in terms of these transitions. Overall, DFLE has improved over recent decades but not always as favourably as life expectancy. The trends indicate compression of disability between ages 50 and 79 in the most recent years. Changes in disability transitions have had the greatest influence, whereas disability-specific mortality has had much less impact on DFLE changes. The greatest contributions have come from increases in the probability of recovery from disability.

Research remains inconclusive on whether increased longevity is resulting in disability compression. Using the Health and Retirement Study and multistate models, this study is the first to examine trends (between 1996-2006 and 2008-18) across multiple key aspects of disability burden: namely, lifetime risk and age at onset of disability; recovery and mortality of the disabled; and disability-free life expectancy (DFLE) at age 50 in the United States' older population. Furthermore, we differentiate these trends by key socio-demographic factors: sex, race/ethnicity, and educational attainment. The analysis shows that over four-fifths of the total life expectancy increase at age 50 was in DFLE. This was accompanied by a one-year postponement in disability onset and insignificant recovery from disability. However, lifetime risk of disability remained unchanged between periods. Disability trends improved more for women than men. Latinx and the lowest-educated adults experienced no improvement in disability onset. The lowest-educated Whites exhibited substantial health deterioration.

In the UK, cohabitation has become the normative type of first co-residential partnership. While some couples go on to marry, others increasingly continue to cohabit or break up. One possible explanation is the rise in young people's economic precariousness. However, few studies have analysed this hypothesis empirically for the UK. By analysing data on cohabiting couple dyads from 1991 to 2019, we explore how economic precariousness (measured by four traits: employment, labour income, savings, and financial perceptions) relates to marriage and to cohabitation dissolution. The types of precarious traits seen in couples, alongside their distribution between partners, are crucial for understanding socio-economic differences in cohabitation outcomes. Marriage is less likely among couples where the man is jobless or has no savings, suggesting that marriage is a financially committed relationship, more reliant on men's resources. Couples where women hold worse financial perceptions than men are most likely to separate, highlighting the importance of subjective measures.

We follow general fertility rates (GFRs) in Switzerland up to 2022, with a focus on their dynamics during and after pandemics. Historical influenza pandemics (1889-90, 1918-20, 1957) have consistently led to temporary declines in births between six and nine months after the pandemic peak. High rates of miscarriage may explain these findings. After the 1889-90 and 1918-20 pandemics, short-term baby booms occurred. For the recent Covid-19 pandemic, the dynamics appear more complex. The GFR had already been declining since 2018, before the pandemic hit Switzerland. During and shortly after the first two waves in 2020, there was an increase in conceptions, leading to a higher GFR in 2021: shutdown measures may have brought planned pregnancies forwards. Subsequently, the GFR declined from February 2022; one possible explanation is that pregnancies were intentionally postponed until after vaccination. Following these population-level observations, more in-depth studies are needed to understand better why fertility is affected by pandemics.

Internal migration fell in high-income countries such as Australia, the UK, and the United States during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. High-level explanations for these declines have referred to developmental stage (Zelinsky's super-advanced society), changed values and preferences (secular rootedness), and long-run socio-demographic change (second demographic transition). We assess the relevance of these overlapping interpretations in the Norwegian context via a combination of direct empirical tests (using full-population register data for 1981-2015 and Oaxaca-Blinder analysis) and indirect assessments based on the inherent features of the Norwegian case study. The net effect of changes in population composition and behaviours has been to increase migration: the upward effects of a more educated population and changed household structures have outweighed the downward effects of population ageing. Our results raise questions about how far these macro explanations of migration decline are generally applicable. We offer some suggestions for future conceptual and empirical investigation.

The experience of losing a child is increasingly uncommon worldwide but is no less devastating for parents who experience it. An overlooked aspect of this phenomenon is its timing: at which age do bereft parents lose a child and how are these ages at loss distributed? We use demographic methods to explore the mean and variability of maternal age at child loss in 18 countries for the 1850-2000 birth cohorts. We find that the distribution of age of child loss is bimodal, with one component representing young offspring deaths and another representing adult offspring deaths. Offspring loss is transitioning from being a relatively common life event, mostly experienced by young mothers, to a rare one spread throughout the maternal life course. Moreover, there is no evidence of convergence in the variability of age at offspring loss. These results advance the formal demography of kinship and underline the need to support bereaved parents across the life course.