The Role of Childlessness in Changes in English Cohort Fertility

The aim of the study is to explore the contribution of childlessness to changes in English cohort fertility over time and in relation to that in other European countries. The study found that during important historical periods of change in English completed fertility a change in childlessness played a very important role: contributing 56% of the large rise in fertility (of 0.42 children per woman) between the 1920 and 1934 cohorts and 44% of the large fall (0.44) between the 1934 and 1960 cohorts. But for more recent cohorts (born since 1960) changes in childlessness played a varying but usually minor role in accounting for changes in English cohort fertility compared with other countries. The paper shows that there are, however, countries in which a rise in childlessness has made large contributions to a large decline in their cohort fertility since the 1960 cohort (e.g. Japan, Spain and Poland). Also, high current levels of childlessness in these countries are an important reason why their cohort fertility is so low compared to England and some other countries of Northern and Western Europe (e.g. Sweden, France and the Netherlands). Based on information on fertility intentions and historical experience it is argued that that changes in childlessness were mainly the result of an accumulation of usually unpredictable period influences on fertility.