Which Couples at Given Parities Expect to have Additional Births? An Exercise in Discriminant Analysis

Do couples at given parities who expect to have additional births differ on selected characteristics from their counterparts who do not expect to have any more children? This question is examined herein focusing attention on the wife’s age, age at marriage, religion, and education and the husband’s education and income. The method used is the discriminant-function analysis. The data are from the 1965 U. S. National Fertility Study. The combined discriminatory power of the social and economic background characteristics examined herein has been found to be greater at higher parities than at lower ones, while the opposite is true of demographic characteristics.