Volume 6 - Article 14 | Pages 383–408
The Fertility Pattern of Twins and the General Population Compared: Evidence from Danish Cohorts 1945-64
By Hans-Peter Kohler, Lisbeth B. Knudsen, Axel Skytthe, Kaare Christensen
Abstract
Twin studies provide an important possibility for demographers to analyze patterns of heritability and to estimate structural models with controls for endowments. These possibilities are increasingly used in the context of fertility and related behaviors. A close congruence between the fertility patterns of twins and that of the general population, however, is an essential pre-condition in order to generalize the results of twin-based investigations of fertility and related behaviors to the general population.
In this paper we therefore compare the fertility of Danish twins born 1945--64 to the fertility pattern of the general population born during the same period. Our analyses find a very close correspondence between the fertility pattern of twins and of the general population. There exist only few statistically significant differences, and the primary difference pertains to the fact that female twins have a slightly later onset of childbearing than non-twins. There are virtually no relevant differences between the fertility patterns of dizygotic and monozygotic twins.
Author's Affiliation
- Hans-Peter Kohler - University of Pennsylvania, United States of America EMAIL
- Lisbeth B. Knudsen - Aalborg University, Denmark EMAIL
- Axel Skytthe - Syddansk Universitet, Denmark EMAIL
- Kaare Christensen - Syddansk Universitet, Denmark EMAIL
Other articles by the same author/authors in Demographic Research
Marital dissolutions and changes in mental health: Evidence from rural Malawi
Volume 44 - Article 41
Is the age difference between partners related to women's earnings?
Volume 41 - Article 15
The population-level impact of public-sector antiretroviral therapy rollout on adult mortality in rural Malawi
Volume 36 - Article 37
Intergenerational Transfers in the Era of HIV/AIDS: Evidence from Rural Malawi
Volume 27 - Article 27
Rates of induced abortion in Denmark according to age, previous births and previous abortions
Volume 21 - Article 22
The Likoma Network Study: Context, data collection and initial results
Volume 21 - Article 15
Subjective expectations in the context of HIV/AIDS in Malawi
Volume 20 - Article 31
The Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project 2004-06: Data collection, data quality, and analysis of attrition
Volume 20 - Article 21
Cohort fertility patterns in the Nordic countries
Volume 20 - Article 14
Overestimating HIV infection:: The construction and accuracy of subjective probabilities of HIV infection in rural Malawi
Volume 20 - Article 6
Human Biodemography: Some challenges and possibilities
Volume 19 - Article 43
Education and second birth rates in Denmark 1981-1994
Volume 17 - Article 8
Modelling regional variation of first-time births in Denmark 1980-1994 by an age-period-cohort model
Volume 13 - Article 23
A summary of Special Collection 1: Social Interactions and HIV/AIDS in Rural Africa
Volume 9 - Article 12
Tempo-Adjusted Period Parity Progression Measures:: Assessing the Implications of Delayed Childbearing for Cohort Fertility in Sweden, the Netherlands and Spain
Volume 6 - Article 7
Tempo-Adjusted Period Parity Progression Measures, Fertility Postponement and Completed Cohort Fertility
Volume 6 - Article 6
Attrition in Longitudinal Household Survey Data: Some Tests for Three Developing-Country Samples
Volume 5 - Article 4
Frailty Modelling for Adult and Old Age Mortality: The Application of a Modified DeMoivre Hazard Function to Sex Differentials in Mortality
Volume 3 - Article 8
Empirical Assessments of Social Networks, Fertility and Family Planning Programs: Nonlinearities and their Implications
Volume 3 - Article 7
Gender Preferences for Children in Europe: Empirical Results from 17 FFS Countries
Volume 2 - Article 1
Talking about AIDS: The influence of communication networks on individual risk perceptions of HIV/AIDS infection and favored protective behaviors in South Nyanza District, Kenya
Special Collection 1 - Article 13
Introduction to "Research on Demographic Aspects of HIV/AIDS in Rural Africa"
Special Collection 1 - Article 1
Most recent similar articles in Demographic Research
The short- and long-term determinants of fertility in Uruguay
Volume 51 - Article 10
| Keywords:
fertility,
panel data,
stages of female reproductive life,
time series,
Uruguay
The big decline: Lowest-low fertility in Uruguay (2016–2021)
Volume 50 - Article 16
| Keywords:
adolescent fertility,
birth order,
fertility,
Latin America,
ultra-low fertility,
Uruguay
Cohort fertility of immigrants to Israel from the former Soviet Union
Volume 50 - Article 13
| Keywords:
age at first birth,
assimilation,
cohort analysis,
fertility,
immigration,
parity,
religiosity
Fertility decline, changes in age structure, and the potential for demographic dividends: A global analysis
Volume 50 - Article 9
| Keywords:
age structure,
demographic dividend,
demographic transition,
fertility,
migration,
population momentum,
working-age population
Analyzing hyperstable population models
Volume 49 - Article 37
| Keywords:
birth trajectory,
cohort analysis,
cyclical populations,
dynamic population model,
fertility,
hyperstable,
period
Download to Citation Manager
PubMed
Google Scholar