Volume 26 - Article 20 | Pages 511–542

From desires to behavior: Moderating factors in a fertility transition

By Sarah R. Hayford, Victor Agadjanian

Print this page  Facebook  Twitter

 

 
Date received:29 Mar 2011
Date published:31 May 2012
Word count:6447
Keywords:fertility, fertility preferences, fertility transition, intention-behavior correspondence, Mozambique, sub-Saharan Africa
DOI:10.4054/DemRes.2012.26.20
 

Abstract

Background: Extensive research in both developed and developing countries has shown that preferences and intentions for future childbearing predict behavior. However, very little of this research has examined high-fertility contexts in sub-Saharan Africa. In particular, the factors that increase or decrease correspondence between fertility desires and behavior in these settings are not well understood.

Objective: This article documents the degree to which the desire to stop childbearing predicts fertility behavior over the short term among married women in rural southern Mozambique, a context where fertility transition is still in the early stages. Analyses test the moderating powers of individual, household, and community characteristics.

Methods: Analyses use data from a longitudinal survey of married women of reproductive age (N=1678) carried out in 2006 and 2009 in rural areas of southern Mozambique. Logistic regression models are estimated to predict childbearing between 2006 and 2009 based on desires to stop childbearing and characteristics measured in 2006.

Results: As expected, the desire to stop childbearing is strongly predictive of fertility behavior. Household wealth, local adult AIDS mortality, and being married to an unsuccessful labor migrant are associated with higher correspondence between reported desire to stop childbearing and fertility behavior.

Conclusions: Both factors related to the ability to carry out desires to stop childbearing and factors related to the strength and consistency of these desires moderate the association between desires and behaviors. Future research should expand measurement of fertility preferences to incorporate their strength and consistency as well as direction.

Author's Affiliation

Sarah R. Hayford - Ohio State University, United States of America [Email]
Victor Agadjanian - University of California, Los Angeles, United States of America [Email]

Other articles by the same author/authors in Demographic Research

» The paradox of change: Religion and fertility decline in South Korea
Volume 44 - Article 23

» Migration, legality, and fertility regulation: Abortion and contraception among migrants and natives in Russia
Volume 38 - Article 42

» Women’s decision-making autonomy and children’s schooling in rural Mozambique
Volume 32 - Article 25

» Sampling and Surveying Hard-to-Reach Populations for Demographic Research: A Study of Female Labor Migrants in Moscow, Russia
Volume 26 - Article 5

» Age, relationship status, and the planning status of births
Volume 23 - Article 13

» Marriage, childbearing, and migration in Kyrgyzstan: Exploring interdependencies
Volume 22 - Article 7

Most recent similar articles in Demographic Research

» Fertility among better-off women in sub-Saharan Africa: Nearing late transition levels across the region
Volume 46 - Article 29    | Keywords: fertility, sub-Saharan Africa

» Accuracy of wives' proxy reports of husbands' fertility preferences in sub-Saharan Africa
Volume 46 - Article 17    | Keywords: fertility, sub-Saharan Africa

» Contraceptive use and fertility transitions: The distinctive experience of sub-Saharan Africa
Volume 46 - Article 4    | Keywords: fertility, sub-Saharan Africa

» “Everyone tries to avoid responsibility” The attenuating role of financial obligations in fertility change among Yorùbá farmers of southwestern Nigeria
Volume 43 - Article 26    | Keywords: fertility, fertility transition

» The emergence of birth limitation as a new stage in the fertility transition in sub-Saharan Africa
Volume 42 - Article 30    | Keywords: fertility transition, sub-Saharan Africa