Through Civil War, Food Crisis and Drought: Trends in Fertility and Nuptiality in Post-Soviet Tajikistan

Effects of extreme climate events and child mortality on total fertility rate in Bangladesh

Floods, storms, and temperature extremes are examples of extreme weather events that have a substantial influence on a country's demographic dynamics, including migration, fertility, and mortality. Changes in population size, composition, and distribution may result from these occurrences. This study, which spans the years 1966-2018, looks at how Bangladesh's total fertility rate (TFR) is affected by extreme weather events and child mortality, including neonatal, infant, male infant, and under-five mortality. We use data from secondary publicly accessible sources, such as the World Bank and The Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT), and we investigate the correlations using the autoregressive integrated moving average model (ARIMA), complemented by bivariate and multivariable analyses. Our findings from the univariate analysis are noteworthy. Total extreme climate events (β = -0.345, 95 % CI: 0.510, -0.180), as well as individual extreme climate events, such as extreme temperatures (β = -1.176, 95 % CI: 1.88, -0.47), floods (β = -0.644, 95 % CI: 1.0729, -0.216), and storms (β = -0.351, 95 % CI: 0.63159, -0.07154), exhibited negative associations with the TFR. Additionally, factors such as contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR) (β = -0.085, 95 % CI: 0.09072, -0.07954) and gross national income (GNI) per capita (β = -0.003, 95 % CI: 0.0041123, -0.0024234) were negatively correlated with the TFR. Conversely, various categories of child mortality, namely, infants (β = 0.041, 95 % CI: 0.040474, 0.042748), males (β = 0.038, 95 % CI:0.037719, 0.039891), and under-five (β = 0.026, 95 % CI:0.025684, 0.026979) - are positively associated with TFR. Controlling for two pivotal confounding factors, time and GNI per capita, yielded consistent results in the multivariate analysis. These findings provide insight on the dual impact of extreme weather events, which can reduce TFR while also raising it through infant mortality. This phenomena may be due to the increased vulnerability of younger children in climate-event-prone areas, prompting parents to seek additional children as both a replacement for lost offspring and an insurance mechanism against future child loss.

Human fertility after a disaster: a systematic literature review

Fertility is a key demographic parameter influenced by disaster. With the growing risk of disasters, interest in the fertility response to a disaster is increasing among the public, policy makers and researchers alike. However, a systematic literature review on how disaster affects live birth counts does not yet exist. We reviewed 50 studies retrieved from a systematic search based on a pre-registered protocol. We found an overall negative impact of disasters on fertility. If any, increases in fertility were mostly linked with weather-related physical disasters. We also identified 13 distinct mechanisms which researchers have considered as underlying the fertility effects of disaster. By contrast to the common belief that disasters are more likely to increase fertility in contexts with already high fertility, we found little evidence to suggest that the total fertility rate of the studied populations was an important predictor of the direction, timing or size of fertility impacts. While this may be because no relationship exists, it may also be due to biases we observed in the literature towards studying high-income countries or high-cost disasters. We summarize the methodological limitations identified from the reviewed studies into six practical recommendations for future research. Our findings inform both the theories behind the fertility effects of disasters and the methods for studying them.

Wedding Amidst War? Armed Conflict and Female Teen Marriage in Azerbaijan

Does armed conflict influence female teen marriage? Despite increasing attention to early marriage, its drivers and consequences, quantitative research on whether teen unions are affected by situations of armed violence is minimal. This paper addresses this gap by examining the relationship between exposure to the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh over 1992-1996 and teen marriage outcomes in Azerbaijan. Using data from the 2006 Demographic and Health Survey and the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, I compare cohorts at risk of teen union before and during the conflict climax years with a modelling strategy that exploits information on forced displacement and spatial variation in conflict violence. Results show that experiencing war violence in adolescent ages, its intensity and frequency are associated with a lower risk of teen marriage. Reductions are largest for the cohorts who spent most of their adolescent ages under conflict and who were displaced as a result. For never-migrant conflict-affected girls, declines extend to the youngest cohorts. The combination of age at conflict occurrence and the experience of disruptive events like forced migration matters for teen marriage outcomes.

Forced Migration and the Childbearing of Women and Men: A Disruption of the Tempo and Quantum of Fertility?

It is well known that migrant fertility is associated with age at migration, but little is known about this relationship for forced migrants. We study an example of displacement in which the entire population of Finnish Karelia was forced to move elsewhere in Finland in the 1940s. This displacement was unique because of its size and scale, because we have data on almost the whole population of both men and women who moved, and because of the similarity between origin and destination. These aspects enable us to investigate the disruptive impact of forced migration, net of other factors such as adaptation and selection. For all ages at migration from one to 20, female forced migrants had lower levels of completed fertility than similar women born in present-day Finland, which suggests a permanent impact of migration. However, women born in the same year as the initial forced migration showed no difference, which may indicate the presence of a counterbalancing fertility-increasing effect, as observed elsewhere for people born during a humanitarian crisis. There is less evidence of an impact for men, which suggests a gendered impact of forced migration-and its timing-on fertility. Results are similar after controlling for social and spatial mobility, indicating that there may be no major trade-off between reproduction and these forms of mobility.

The ties that bind? Marriage formation, consanguinity and war in Lebanon and Palestine

The paper explores the link between the civil war (1975–1990) in Lebanon and the first Intifada (1987–1993) in Palestine, and women’s transition to marriage and consanguinity. It marries the literature on demographic behaviour and social ties, and contributes to nascent literature on demographic behaviour in times of war extended to consanguinity. It uses a mixed methods approach using two nationally representative data sets- one from each country, complemented with in-depth interviews (n = 55). Estimation methods are a discrete-time hazard model for entry into marriage and a discrete-time competing risks model for type of marriage. Findings provide empirical support for a war-induced effect on marriage formation, with a conflict-induced educational differential, especially for higher educated women in both settings. In times of war, Lebanese, and Palestinian women and their families resort to marriage as a protective strategy, especially when further educational pursuit is no longer deemed relevant because of both actual and perceived threats to women’s safety. The strategies that women devise however, differ across both countries. Women in Lebanon strategize out-group marriages to diversify resources by establishing new alliances through marriage, while in-group marriages decline. Palestinian women on the other hand, show more heterogeneity, with some women maintaining existing familial bonds through in-group marriages, while others diversify resources through out-group marriages to facilitate new alliances. The differences in women’s strategies in each setting is also indicative of other context contingent conflict-induced mechanisms. These operate through distorted sex-ratios against women in Lebanon, and through the breakage of kin networks through migration/displacement in Palestine.

Investigating the Relationship between Food Insecurity and Fertility Preferences in Tanzania

OBJECTIVE

We analyze fertility preferences among women at risk of pregnancy with children ages five or younger as a function of two food security metrics: perceptions of household hunger and child stunting (height for age z scores ≤ -2.0) in order to convey a robust picture of food insecurity.

METHODS

We use data from the 2016 Tanzania Demographic and Health Surveys to analyze this research question. Multinomial generalized logit models with cluster-adjusted standard errors are used to determine the association between different dimensions of food insecurity and individual-level fertility preferences.

RESULTS

On average, women who experience household hunger are 19% less likely to want more children compared to women who do not experience household hunger (AOR: 0.81, p = 0.02) when controlling for education, residence, maternal age, number of living children, and survey month. Adjusting for the same covariates, having at least one child ≤ 5 years old who is stunted is associated with 13% reduced odds of wanting more children compared to having no children stunted (AOR: 0.87, p = 0.06).

CONCLUSIONS FOR PRACTICE

In the context of a divided literature base, this research aligns with the previous work identifying a preference among women to delay or avoid pregnancy during times of food insecurity. The similarity in magnitude and direction of the association between food insecurity and fertility preferences across the two measures of food insecurity suggest a potential association between lived or perceived resource insecurity and fertility aspirations. Further research is needed in order to establish a mechanism through which food insecurity affects fertility preferences.

SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT

Individual fertility preferences are sensitive to dynamic multi-level factors in a woman's life. While qualitative research has explored the effect that food insecurity and associated resource constraints have on fertility preferences, results are conflicting. Here, we quantitatively examine how individual woman's fertility preferences associate with two measures of food insecurity and qualitatively compare the associations across food insecurity measures. We establish that two food insecurity measures- household hunger and child stunting- capture similar populations and have similar associations with fertility preferences. This is a critical step forward in understanding the dynamic relationship between resource availability, child well-being, and fertility preferences.

The Effects of Conflict on Fertility: Evidence From the Genocide in Rwanda

Our study analyzes the fertility effects of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. We study the effects of violence on both the duration time to the first birth in the early post-genocide period and on the total number of post-genocide births per woman up to 15 years following the conflict. We use individual-level data from Demographic and Health Surveys, estimating survival and count data models. This article contributes to the literature on the demographic effects of violent conflict by testing two channels through which conflict influences fertility: (1) the type of violence exposure as measured by the death of a child or sibling, and (2) the conflict-induced change in local demographic conditions as captured by the change in the district-level sex ratio. Results indicate the genocide had heterogeneous effects on fertility, depending on the type of violence experienced by the woman, her age cohort, parity, and the time horizon (5, 10, and 15 years after the genocide). There is strong evidence of a child replacement effect. Having experienced the death of a child during the genocide increases both the hazard of having a child in the five years following the genocide and the total number of post-genocide births. Experiencing sibling death during the genocide significantly lowers post-genocide fertility in both the short-run and the long-run. Finally, a reduction in the local sex ratio negatively impacts the hazard of having a child in the five years following the genocide, especially for older women.

Spacing, Stopping, or Postponing? Fertility Desires in a Sub-Saharan Setting

A growing body of research has argued that the traditional categories of stopping and spacing are insufficient to understand why individuals want to control fertility. In a series of articles, Timæus, Moultrie, and colleagues defined a third type of fertility motivation-postponement-that reflects a desire to avoid childbearing in the short term without clear goals for long-term fertility. Although postponement is fundamentally a description of fertility desires, existing quantitative research has primarily studied fertility behavior in an effort to find evidence for the model. In this study, we use longitudinal survey data to consider whether postponement can be identified in standard measures of fertility desires among reproductive-age women in rural Mozambique. Findings show strong evidence for a postponement mindset in this population, but postponement coexists with stopping and spacing goals. We reflect on the difference between birth spacing and postponement and consider whether and how postponement is a distinctive sub-Saharan phenomenon.

Fertility and union formation during crisis and societal consolidation in the Western Balkans

Fertility decline in central and eastern Europe (CEE) since the fall of the communist regimes has been driven by both stopping and postponement of childbearing: two processes that have been related to crisis and economic development, respectively. In the Western Balkans these economic and political contexts followed each other in the form of a biphasic transition. I examine whether this sequence triggered fertility responses like those observed elsewhere. Relying on three independent data sources, I cross-validate the levels of, and describe the trends in, union formation and fertility (by birth order) between 1980 and 2010. Results do not reveal widespread declines in fertility to lowest-low levels during the most acute period of crisis. The subsequent postponement of marriage and first birth was also limited, and the two-child family remains the norm. This relative resilience of childbearing patterns compared with other CEE countries is discussed with reference to the institutional context.

Ethnic Dimensions of Guatemala's Stalled Transition: A Parity-Specific Analysis of Ladino and Indigenous Fertility Regimes

In some contemporary populations, fertility levels appear to plateau, with women maintaining a consistently high level of fertility for a relatively extended period. Because this plateau does not reflect the historical patterns observed in Europe, the focus of most studies on fertility patterns, mechanisms underlying the plateau and the reinstatement of a decline have not been fully explored and are not fully understood. Through the construction of fertility histories of 25,000 women using multiple years of health survey data, we analyze some of the components of stalled fertility as they pertain to Guatemala, the only Central American country to have experienced a stalled fertility decline.

Immigrant–native fertility differentials: The Afghans in Iran

International migration is increasingly important in shaping national population dynamics, both directly through adding or subtracting people, and indirectly, through the fertility of immigrants. International migrants rarely share the fertility characteristics of either origin or destination populations. However, the relationship between migration and fertility is little understood, especially that relating to refugee populations. This study examined the fertility differentials of one of the world’s largest refugee populations, the Afghans in Iran, in relation to the host population. Based on multivariate analysis, the study demonstrated that Afghan immigrants were moving from a high fertility regime to a low fertility regime. The findings suggest that fertility change among Afghans is associated with their adaptation to Iranian society. The role of education in mediating immigrant–native fertility differentials was also uncovered.

The changing sex ratios at birth during the civil war in Tajikistan: 1992-1997

Sex ratios at birth are known to change during wars or shortly after. This study investigated changes in sex ratios during the civil war that occurred in Tajikistan after the dismantling of the Soviet Union. This civil war was particularly bloody and long lasting, and had many demographic consequences. According to vital registration data, some 27,000 persons died in excess of previous trends during the civil war period (1992-1997), and total mortality was sometimes estimated to be three times higher by independent observers. Birth rates dropped markedly during the war, and sex ratios at birth increased significantly from 104.6 before the war to 106.9 during the war, to return to baseline values afterwards. The change in sex ratio is investigated according to demographic evidence (migration, delayed marriage, spouse separation), substantiated with qualitative evidence (difficulties with food supply), and compared with patterns found in Europe during World War II, as well as with recent wars in the Middle East.