Volume 21 - Article 31 | Pages 915–944  

High Suburban Fertility: Evidence from Four Northern European Countries

By Hill Kulu, Paul Boyle, Gunnar Andersson

Abstract

This study examines fertility variation across different residential contexts in four Northern European countries: Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. We move beyond the conventional urban-rural focus of most previous studies of within-nation variations in fertility by distinguishing between urban centres and suburbs of cities and towns. We base our study on aggregate and individual-level register data and our analysis shows that fertility levels are significantly higher in suburbs than in urban centres; this pattern has persisted over the past quarter of a century for all four countries. A parity-specific analysis of Swedish register data reveals that total fertility varies between central cities and suburbs due to the relatively high first- and second-birth propensities in the suburbs. Further analysis shows that fertility variation between the central cities and suburbs persists after controlling for women’s socioeconomic characteristics. We discuss the role of various factors in accounting for high suburban fertility including omitted individual characteristics, contextual factors and selective residential moves of couples planning to have a child.

Author's Affiliation

Other articles by the same author/authors in Demographic Research

Premarital cohabitation and divorce: Support for the "Trial Marriage" Theory?
Volume 23 - Article 31

Lives saved, lives lost, and under-reported COVID-19 deaths: Excess and non-excess mortality in relation to cause-specific mortality during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in Sweden
Volume 50 - Article 1

Union formation and fertility amongst immigrants from Pakistan and their descendants in the United Kingdom: A multichannel sequence analysis
Volume 48 - Article 10

Disentangling the Swedish fertility decline of the 2010s
Volume 47 - Article 12

Family life transitions, residential relocations, and housing in the life course: Current research and opportunities for future work: Introduction to the Special Collection on “Separation, Divorce, and Residential Mobility in a Comparative Perspective”
Volume 43 - Article 2

Separation, divorce, and housing tenure: A cross-country comparison
Volume 41 - Article 39

Homeownership after separation: A longitudinal analysis of Finnish register data
Volume 41 - Article 29

Union dissolution and housing trajectories in Britain
Volume 41 - Article 7

A decade of life-course research on fertility of immigrants and their descendants in Europe
Volume 40 - Article 46

Co-ethnic marriage versus intermarriage among immigrants and their descendants: A comparison across seven European countries using event-history analysis
Volume 39 - Article 17

Social policies, separation, and second birth spacing in Western Europe
Volume 37 - Article 37

Life-table representations of family dynamics in the 21st century
Volume 37 - Article 35

Depressed fertility among descendants of immigrants in Sweden
Volume 36 - Article 39

Why does fertility remain high among certain UK-born ethnic minority women?
Volume 35 - Article 49

Introduction to research on immigrant and ethnic minority families in Europe
Volume 35 - Article 2

Union formation and dissolution among immigrants and their descendants in the United Kingdom
Volume 33 - Article 10

Marriage and divorce of immigrants and descendants of immigrants in Sweden
Volume 33 - Article 2

Economic Uncertainty and Family Dynamics in Europe: Introduction
Volume 27 - Article 28

Labor-market status, migrant status and first childbearing in Sweden
Volume 27 - Article 25

Cohort fertility patterns in the Nordic countries
Volume 20 - Article 14

Childbearing dynamics of couples in a universalistic welfare state: The role of labor-market status, country of origin, and gender
Volume 17 - Article 30

Migration and union dissolution in a changing socio-economic context: The case of Russia
Volume 17 - Article 27

Fertility differences by housing type: The effect of housing conditions or of selective moves?
Volume 17 - Article 26

Migration and first-time parenthood: Evidence from Kyrgyzstan
Volume 17 - Article 25

Family change and migration in the life course: An introduction
Volume 17 - Article 19

Understanding parental gender preferences in advanced societies: Lessons from Sweden and Finland
Volume 17 - Article 6

Educational attainment and ultimate fertility among Swedish women born in 1955-59
Volume 14 - Article 16

Education and childlessness: The relationship between educational field, educational level, and childlessness among Swedish women born in 1955-59
Volume 14 - Article 15

Social differentials in speed-premium effects in childbearing in Sweden
Volume 14 - Article 4

Demographic trends in Sweden: An update of childbearing and nuptiality up to 2002
Volume 11 - Article 4

A summary of Special Collection 3: Contemporary Research on European Fertility: Perspectives and Developments
Volume 10 - Article 13

Children's experience of family disruption and family formation: Evidence from 16 FFS countries
Volume 7 - Article 7

Life-table representations of family dynamics in Sweden, Hungary, and 14 other FFS countries: A project of descriptions of demographic behavior
Volume 7 - Article 4

Fertility developments in Norway and Sweden since the early 1960s
Volume 6 - Article 4

Demographic trends in Sweden: Childbearing developments in 1961-2000, marriage and divorce developments in 1971-1999
Volume 5 - Article 3

Childbearing Developments in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden from the 1970s to the 1990s: A Comparison
Special Collection 3 - Article 7

Contemporary Research on European Fertility: Introduction
Special Collection 3 - Article 1

Most recent similar articles in Demographic Research

Mortality inequalities at retirement age between migrants and non-migrants in Denmark and Sweden
Volume 50 - Article 18    | Keywords: immigration, life expectancy, lifespan inequality, Nordic countries, pension age, pension policy

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