scholarly journals Social Science Genetics and Fertility

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix C Tropf
Keyword(s):  
Molecular Genetic ◽  
Age At First Birth ◽  
Life Outcomes ◽  
Environment Change ◽  
Fertility Choice ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Human Fertility ◽  
First Child ◽  
Molecular Genetic Data ◽  
The Social

To what extent do genes influence the age at which you have your first child and the total number of children that you have? Does the (social) environment change genetic effects on fertility? Do genes lead to spurious associations between life outcomes such as education and age at first birth? The social sciences have been reticent to integrate a genetic approach to the study of fertility choice and behaviour, resulting in theories and findings that are largely socially deterministic. This dissertation investigates genetic and environmental influences on human fertility—aswell as their interplay—using both twin data as well as molecular genetic data of more than 31,000 genotyped individuals from 6 countries.

scholarly journals Schizophrenia and subsequent neighborhood deprivation: revisiting the social drift hypothesis using population, twin and molecular genetic data

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. e796-e796 ◽  
Author(s):  
A Sariaslan ◽  
S Fazel ◽  
B M D'Onofrio ◽  
N Långström ◽  
H Larsson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Molecular Genetic ◽  
Genetic Data ◽  
Neighborhood Deprivation ◽  
Molecular Genetic Data ◽  
The Social

scholarly journals Formation of a system of real support measures large families

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 349-357
Author(s):  
Nina Voskolovich ◽  
Ibragimkhalil Askhabaliyev
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Large Family ◽  
Living Standards ◽  
State Support ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Financial Conditions ◽  
Income Family ◽  
First Child ◽  
The Social ◽  
Large Families

The article summarizes the results of the analysis of the use of instruments of state support for large families in Russia, taking into account the social and demographic situation. The purpose of the study is to analyze is to substantiate proposals for direct real support of large families to overcome the trend of depopulation in Russia. The categories «large family», «low-income family» and «low-income family» have been clarified to determine the most effective measures to support large families. Measures of state support for large families have been differentiated according to the characteristics of their direct or indirect, potential or actual receipt by such families, which allows us to assess their effectiveness in stimulating an increase in the birth rate. The analysis of the contribution of large families to the increase in natural population growth is given, the influence of such factors as a reduction in the reproductive contingent, in particular, due to a decrease in the number of women of fertile age, an increase in the average age of mothers giving birth to their first child and subsequent children, a decrease in the mother's living standards in large families is shown. A study of the state support for large families operating in Russian regions was carried out, which made it possible to reveal the prevalence of indirect potential tools over direct real ones that do not have a significant effect on improving the conditions and living standards of families with three or more children. As a result of the analytical study, a potential opportunity was revealed to solve the problems of depopulation by creating material and financial conditions for increasing the number of large families. The progressive foreign experience on the use of direct real measures to support large families, depending on the number of children being brought up, is generalized. Recommendations for improving the effectiveness of measures to support large families by providing real (direct) state support have been substantiated

Marital Fertility and the Family in Poland from the Late Nineteenth to the Early Twentieth Century

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 279-303 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grażyna Liczbińska ◽  
Ewa Syska ◽  
Renata Koziarska-Kasperczyk ◽  
Anna Kledzik
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Marital Fertility ◽  
Age At First Birth ◽  
First Birth ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Age At Marriage ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
First Child ◽  
The Family ◽  
Late Nineteenth

Research in the obscure domicile files of Poznań’s Municipal Records reveals that in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Poznań, fertility was determined by the interaction of many socioeconomic factors. Mothers’ birth cohort and husbands’ socioeconomic status proved to be the strongest factors significantly influencing women’s age at matrimony, their age at first birth, and their number of children. Women born before 1890 married and started giving birth to the first child later than those born after 1890. The wives of workers and craftsmen started reproduction earlier and had more children than those of white-collar professionals. Religion did not influence women’s age at marriage and age at first birth, but it did influence their number of children.

scholarly journals Mega-analysis of 31,396 individuals from 6 countries uncovers strong gene-environment interaction for human fertility

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix C. Tropf ◽  
Renske M. Verweij ◽  
Peter J. van der Most ◽  
Gert Stulp ◽  
Andrew Bakshi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Individual Differences ◽  
Twin Studies ◽  
Genetic Effects ◽  
Age At First Birth ◽  
Environment Interaction ◽  
First Birth ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Human Fertility ◽  
Gene Environment

AbstractFamily and twin studies suggest that up to 50% of individual differences in human fertility within a population might be heritable. However, it remains unclear whether the genes associated with fertility outcomes such as number of children ever born (NEB) or age at first birth (AFB) are the same across geographical and historical environments. By not taking this into account, previous genetic studies implicitly assumed that the genetic effects are constant across time and space. We conduct a mega-analysis applying whole genome methods on 31,396 unrelated men and women from six Western countries. Across all individuals and environments, common single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) explained only ~4% of the variance in NEB and AFB. We then extend these models to test whether genetic effects are shared across different environments or unique to them. For individuals belonging to the same population and demographic cohort (born before or after the 20th century fertility decline), SNP-based heritability was almost five times higher at 22% for NEB and 19% for AFB. We also found no evidence suggesting that genetic effects on fertility are shared across time and space. Our findings imply that the environment strongly modifies genetic effects on the tempo and quantum of fertility, that currently ongoing natural selection is heterogeneous across environments, and that gene-environment interactions may partly account for missing heritability in fertility. Future research needs to combine efforts from genetic research and from the social sciences to better understand human fertility.Authors SummaryFertility behavior – such as age at first birth and number of children – varies strongly across historical time and geographical space. Yet, family and twin studies, which suggest that up to 50% of individual differences in fertility are heritable, implicitly assume that the genes important for fertility are the same across both time and space. Using molecular genetic data (SNPs) from over 30,000 unrelated individuals from six different countries, we show that different genes influence fertility in different time periods and different countries, and that the genetic effects consistently related to fertility are presumably small. The fact that genetic effects on fertility appear not to be universal could have tremendous implications for research in the area of reproductive medicine, social science and evolutionary biology alike.

The Paradox of Poverty: Socio-Economic Aspects of Population Growth.— By T. Scarlett Epstein and Darrell Jackson. The Macmillan of India Limited Delhi, 1975. pp.127.

1978 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 380-382
Author(s):  
M. Javed Akbar Zaki
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Economic Security ◽  
Rural India ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Economic Progress ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Fertility Decision ◽  
The Social

To many social theoreticians, the population explosion, particularly in the developing nations presents a crippling threat to their developmental pro¬cesses. Their argument's validity rests mainly on the assumption that expected economic progress is swallowed up by unbalanced rise of numbers in the population. The book being reviewed deals mainly with this subject matter and is divided into two parts, each containing three articles contributed by various researchers. Part one, 'The Social context of Fertility Decision' is focused on analyzing the role of factors affecting fertility at the micro-level decision making process. The first article 'Fertility decision in rural India' by Vinod Jainath, examines the applicability to rural India of various models of the process of fertility decision making and finds most of these wanting with respect to the Indian social situation. While analyzing the fertility patterns of Rural India, he points out the positive need for larger families among the poor small farmers mainly due to labour supply considerations. The author argues that unemployment and under¬employment actually motivate the poor to have more children as it better ensures their economic security in their old age. As the chances of gaining employ¬ment for their offspring diminish, they are induced to increase the total number of children in order that atleast one will be able to support them. Thus a vicious circle of poverty arises in large families because of each of the parents wanting to increase their children's chances of employment by ultimately reducing the overall employment opportunities even further and exacerbating their poverty.

Individual and Societal Well-Being

2018 ◽  
pp. 698-722
Author(s):  
Shigehiro Oishi ◽  
Samantha J. Heintzleman
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Life Outcomes ◽  
Cultural Meanings ◽  
Research Topics ◽  
Psychological Science ◽  
The Social ◽  
Genetic Origins

This chapter highlights the contributions that have been made by personality and social psychology, respectively and together, to the science of well-being. Since its humble beginning in the 1930s, the science of well-being has grown to become one of the most vibrant research topics in psychological science today. The personality tradition of well-being research has shown that it is possible to measure well-being reliably, that self-reported well-being predicts important life outcomes, and that well-being has nontrivial genetic origins. The social psychology tradition has illuminated that there are various cultural meanings of well-being, that responses to well-being questions involve multiple cognitive processes, that happiness is experienced often in relationship contexts, and that it is possible to improve one’s well-being. Finally, there are recent methodological integrations of the personality and social psychology perspectives that delineate person–situation interactions.

scholarly journals Cognitive ability and fertility among Swedish men born 1951–1967: evidence from military conscription registers

2019 ◽  
Vol 286 (1902) ◽  
pp. 20190359 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Kolk ◽  
Kieron Barclay
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Ability ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Positive Relationship ◽  
Military Conscription ◽  
First Child ◽  
Parental Background ◽  
The Social ◽  
Intelligence Scores ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Educational Careers

We examine the relationship between cognitive ability and childbearing patterns in contemporary Sweden using administrative register data. The topic has a long history in the social sciences and has been the topic of a large number of studies, many reporting a negative gradient between intelligence and fertility. We link fertility histories to military conscription tests with intelligence scores for all Swedish men born 1951–1967. We find a positive relationship between intelligence scores and fertility, and this pattern is consistent across the cohorts we study. The relationship is most pronounced for the transition to a first child, and men with the lowest categories of IQ scores have the fewest children. Using fixed effects models, we additionally control for all factors that are shared by siblings, and after such adjustments, we find a stronger positive relationship between IQ and fertility. Furthermore, we find a positive gradient within groups at different levels of education. Compositional differences of this kind are therefore not responsible for the positive gradient we observe—instead, the relationship is even stronger after controlling for both educational careers and parental background factors. In our models where we compare brothers to one another, we find that, relative to men with IQ 100, the group with the lowest category of cognitive ability have 0.56 fewer children, and men with the highest category have 0.09 more children.

scholarly journals Common Diseases and Some Demographic Characteristics among Saudi Women

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (12) ◽  
pp. 94 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ahmed Abdulrahman Al-Haramlah ◽  
Fawziah Al-Bakr ◽  
Haniah Merza
Keyword(s):  
Physical Activity ◽  
Health Centers ◽  
Saudi Women ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Common Diseases ◽  
The Social ◽  
Study Results ◽  
The Common ◽  
Obesity Hypertension

<p class="apa">This study aimed to detect the common diseases among Saudi women and their relationship with the level of physical activity and some variables. This study was applied to 1233 Saudi woman in different regions of the Kingdom, and adopted to explore the common diseases: obesity, hypertension, diabetes, cholesterol and asthma.</p><p class="apa">The study results showed the existence of a statistically significant relationship between the common diseases among Saudi women and the variables of educational level, the nature of the profession, the social status, the justification of the practice of physical activity, the rate of participation in physical activity per week, the practice of physical activity in relation to asthma and the number of children with regard to obesity.</p><p class="apa">The study provided a number of recommendations including: the need to strengthen the role of culture in promoting physical activity by women, through health education via the health centers in the Kingdom.</p>

scholarly journals Does natural selection favour taller stature among the tallest people on earth?

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1806) ◽  
pp. 20150211 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gert Stulp ◽  
Louise Barrett ◽  
Felix C. Tropf ◽  
Melinda Mills
Keyword(s):  
Natural Selection ◽  
Reproductive Success ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Child Survival ◽  
Average Height ◽  
Tall Stature ◽  
Age At First Birth ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
The North ◽  
Rate Of Increase

The Dutch are the tallest people on earth. Over the last 200 years, they have grown 20 cm in height: a rapid rate of increase that points to environmental causes. This secular trend in height is echoed across all Western populations, but came to an end, or at least levelled off, much earlier than in The Netherlands. One possibility, then, is that natural selection acted congruently with these environmentally induced changes to further promote tall stature among the people of the lowlands. Using data from the LifeLines study, which follows a large sample of the population of the north of The Netherlands ( n = 94 516), we examined how height was related to measures of reproductive success (as a proxy for fitness). Across three decades (1935–1967), height was consistently related to reproductive output (number of children born and number of surviving children), favouring taller men and average height women. This was despite a later age at first birth for taller individuals. Furthermore, even in this low-mortality population, taller women experienced higher child survival, which contributed positively to their increased reproductive success. Thus, natural selection in addition to good environmental conditions may help explain why the Dutch are so tall.

Youthful mothering? Exploring the meaning of adulthood and youthfulness within the maternal identity work of young Swedish mothers

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-372 ◽  
Author(s):  
Magdalena Sjöberg ◽  
Hanna Bertilsdotter-Rosqvist
Keyword(s):  
Life Course ◽  
Identity Work ◽  
Chronological Age ◽  
Developmental Task ◽  
Young Mothers ◽  
Maternal Identity ◽  
Psychological Approach ◽  
First Child ◽  
The Social ◽  
Responsible Adult

In this paper, we explore meanings of adulthood and youthfulness in relation to notions of life course, good motherhood, and girlhood among young mothers in Sweden. Our analysis was informed by a discursive psychological approach and was based on interview conversations with 17 mothers who were 13–25 years old at the birth of their first child. In our analysis, we identified two repertoires – the ‘social age’ repertoire and the ‘chronological age’ repertoire. The interviewees invoked the two repertoires to position themselves and others as either responsible adult mothers or as responsible youthful mothers. Meanings of adulthood are central within the idea of motherhood, and by deviating from their expected life course young mothers are often understood as non-adults who are incapable of fulfilling the developmental task of motherhood. Our work suggests that the maternal identity work of young mothers takes place within discourses of both adulthood and youthfulness.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document