Is the Family Size of Parents and Children Still Related? Revisiting the Cross-Generational Relationship Over the Last Century

This article analyzes the strength of the intergenerational transmission of family size over the last century, including a focus on this reproduction in large and small families. Using the large-scale French Family Survey (2011), we show a weak but significant correlation of approximately 0.12 –0.15, which is comparable with levels in other Western countries. It is stronger for women than men, with a gender convergence across cohorts. A decrease in intergenerational transmission is observed across birth cohorts regardless of whether socioeconomic factors are controlled, supporting the i dea that the family of origin has lost implicit and explicit influence on fertility choices. As parents were adopting the two-child family norm, the number of siblings lost its importance for having two children, but it continues to explain lower parity and, above all, three-child families. This sug gests that the third child has increasingly become an “extra child” (beyond the norm) favored by people from large families.
Source: Demography - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research