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The Incidence of Involuntary Marital Childlessness
Author(s) -
GYLLENSWÄRD CURT
Publication year - 1954
Publication title -
acta pædiatrica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.772
H-Index - 115
eISSN - 1651-2227
pISSN - 0803-5253
DOI - 10.1111/j.1651-2227.1954.tb15484.x
Subject(s) - childlessness , wife , demography , census , population , incidence (geometry) , medicine , marital status , rural area , fertility , sociology , law , physics , optics , pathology , political science
Summary The incidence of involuntary marital childlessness has long been given, and is still given, as 15 to 10 per cent. Approximately this incidence is, in fact, found in marriages with a minimum duration of 15 years in investigations made in Scandinavia both around 1890 and 1930. It is demonstrated that the incidence was, in reality, only about 3 per cent, in marriages of at least 15 years' duration and a maximum age of the wife at rnaxriege of 30 years, in a population in the midlands of Sweden, comprising both urban and rural districts, during the 18th and 19th centuries. This figure also applies in the following cases: the whole population of Sweden in the census of 1930; in marriages of at least 15 years' duration and a maximum age of the wife at marriage of 30 years, in all marriages‐irrespective of the duration—in a limited, well—situated population group in rural districts in Sweden in 1930; and in marriages of 10–15 years' duration, and an age at marriage of 20–24 years, in a population employed in agriculture and subsidiary occupations in the census of the same year. The actual involuntary infertility niay be presumed to be still lower, since stillbirths, many deaths in early infancy, and abortions are not included. It is shown that a successive displacement of not inconsiderable extent has occurred, in that voluntary childlessness is practised during a longer period of the marriage, and thus until the wife is older than was formerly the case. This also applies in marriages in which a t least one child is eventually born. Even during the 19th century, a tendency is found—which thereafter has increased successively—for the wife to be disinclined to give birth to a child at this higher age and, in fact, as soon as after 25–30 years of age. The possible influence of this factor on later attempts to conceive is discussed. It is concluded that the view that voluntarily completely childless marriages are rare on psychological grounds has presumably long ceased to be generally applicable to large population groups in Sweden. It is pointed out that it is incorrect, from the point of view of population policy, to withhold social benefits—such as the children's allowance—from the first child, and to base such a policy on the hope that efforts will always be made to have at least one child.