Open AccessAre there too many “times-to-pregnancy”?
Author(s) -
Jørn Olsen
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
scandinavian journal of work, environment and health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.621
H-Index - 103
eISSN - 1795-990X
pISSN - 0355-3140
DOI - 10.5271/sjweh.3548
Subject(s) - fecundity , cohabitation , fertility , pregnancy , measure (data warehouse) , demography , family planning , medicine , psychology , population , research methodology , computer science , sociology , biology , political science , law , genetics , database
The time between marriage and the birth of the first child has been used by demographers as a measure of fecundity, but such a measure only works if cohabitation and wanting to have a child are closely linked to marriage. In a world where pregnancies can be planned for those who have access to safe contraception methods, couples may know their "time-to-pregnancy" (TTP) as the waiting time from when they stopped using contraceptive methods until becoming pregnant or being classified as infertile (a period of ≥ 12 months). This TTP measure was first used in 1981 (1) as a measure of couple fecundity and it has been applied widely with success and failure in many areas of research including work-related fecundity problems (2, 3, 4). In this letter, some less well-known limitations of the TTP measure are discussed.