Flexibility in reproductive timing in human females: integrating ultimate and proximate explanations

Nettle, Daniel

doi:10.1098/rstb.2010.0073

Cited by 121 publications

(115 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…The expansion of higher education and the resulting later age of completing education and entering of the labour market (as well as the concomitant increase in the share of women entering the labour market) have been repeatedly identified as important factors (Blossfeld and Huinink 1991;Gustafsson and Kalwij 2006;Goldin 2006;Ní Bhrolcháin and Beaujouan 2012). Other factors include the spread of hormonal contraception, rising economic and employment uncertainty in young adulthood, decline of marriage, the rise of more unstable forms of partnerships, and the spread of new values incompatible with parenthood Goldin and Katz 2002;Sobotka 2004a;Mills and Blossfeld 2005;Goldin 2006;Mills et al 2011;Leridon 2006;Nettle 2011). …”

Section: Fertility Postponement and Its Impact On Period Fertilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Future Fertility in Low Fertility Countries

Basten

Sobotka

Zeman

et al. 2014

World Population and Human Capital in the Twenty-First Century

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Future Fertility in Low Fertility Countries AbstractThis paper discusses results of the global survey of experts on the future of low fertility in low-fertility countries. The survey was coordinated by the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital as a part of an effort to produce global argumentbased population projections by age, sex and level of education. First we give an overview of fertility changes in major low-fertility regions. Next we outline main theoretical arguments and review a wide range of factors contributing to fertility change and variation in contemporary low-fertility settings. Subsequently, we present survey results based on 184 assessments of over 170 experts analysing 41 countries with currently low or aroundreplacement fertility and Israel. These experts provided forecasts of period total fertility rate (TFR) in 2030 and 2050, estimated 80% confidence interval of their forecast and assessed the validity and potential impact on fertility of 46 factors. We also compare expert-derived projections of the TFR trends with the forecasts formulated by the UN World Population Prospects in 2010. The survey results in combination with the feedback provided by the invited experts then serve as a basis for formulating a set of projection scenarios for all low fertility countries up until 2050, which are additionally expanded (in a simpler form) through 2200. We present these scenarios and discuss past changes in fertility differences by level of education and their potential future trends in main regions. Presented analyses and projections indicate that a global convergence of fertility to around replacement level, envisioned in the UN projections, appears unlikely. Continuing differentiation combined with partial convergence in fertility towards lower levels is suggested as a more plausible scenario, with East Asia (including China) as well as Russia expected to have sustained very low fertility below 1.5 through 2050.

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Section: Fertility Postponement and Its Impact On Period Fertilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Future Fertility in Low Fertility Countries

Basten

Sobotka

Zeman

et al. 2014

World Population and Human Capital in the Twenty-First Century

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“…Crucial to understanding the complexities of these associations are the mediating and moderating factors that contribute to fertility decisions throughout a woman's life. Socio-economic status, owing to its relationship with resource availability, is crucial to this and must be explored carefully across the lifespan, not merely discarded as a confounder [97,98]. Therefore, a life-history strategy may respond to sensitive periods of development (e.g.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…reproductive timing) usefully synthesizes areas of research and generates potential future research directions [97,98]. Although not an exhaustive list, we examine the evidence that birth weight, childhood body composition, risky health behaviours and the developmental origins of attractiveness influence fertility.…”

Section: Mechanisms Linking the Developmental Environment And Fertilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Developmental influences on fertility decisions by women: an evolutionary perspective

Coall

Tickner

McAllister

et al. 2016

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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Developmental environments are crucial for shaping our life course. Elements of the early social and biological environments have been consistently associated with reproduction in humans. To date, a strong focus has been on the relationship between early stress, earlier menarche and first child birth in women. These associations, found predominately in high-income countries, have been usefully interpreted within life-history theory frameworks. Fertility, on the other hand—a missing link between an individual's early environment, reproductive strategy and fitness—has received little attention. Here, we synthesize this literature by examining the associations between early adversity, age at menarche and fertility and fecundity in women. We examine the evidence that potential mechanisms such as birth weight, childhood body composition, risky health behaviours and developmental influences on attractiveness link the early environment and fecundity and fertility. The evidence that menarche is associated with fertility and fecundity is good. Currently, owing to the small number of correlational studies and mixed methodologies, the evidence that early adversity predicts fecundity and fertility is not conclusive. This area of research is in its infancy; studies examining early adversity and adult fertility decisions that can also examine likely biological, social and psychological pathways present opportunities for future fertility research.

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“…Relying on anthropometric measures of maturation (rate of development of breasts and axillary hair), growth and reproduction of adolescent girls, we were able to test the predictions of predictive-adaptive hypotheses [1,2,4,12,15,16] that father's death accelerates (i) sexual maturation and (ii) reproduction. Additionally, we tested (iii) whether father's death suppresses growth of daughters in order to elucidate the importance of paternal resource provisioning.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Responding to cues of environmental harshness and uncertainty by speeding up reproduction-even at the expense of somatic and social costs-is adaptive [1,2], at least in situations where such cues turn out to be correct [3]. In humans, the focus of research on such predictiveadaptive responses has been on the timing of pubertal maturation, sexual debut and first pregnancy, in relation to childhood psychosocial adversities [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Father's death does not affect growth and maturation but hinders reproduction: evidence from adolescent girls in post-war Estonia

Hõrak

Valge

2015

Biol. Lett.

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The popular concept of predictive-adaptive responses poses that girls growing up without a father present in the family mature and start reproduction earlier because the father's absence is a cue for environmental harshness and uncertainty that favours switching to a precocious life-history strategy. Most studies supporting this concept have been performed in situations where the father's absence is caused by divorce or abandonment. Using a dataset of Estonian adolescent girls who had lost their fathers over the period of World War II, we show that father's death did not affect the rate of pubertal maturation (assessed on the basis of development of breasts and axillary hair) or growth. Father's death did not affect the age of first birth but, contrary to predictions, reduced lifetime reproductive success. Our findings thus do not support the concept of predictive-adaptive responses and suggest that alternative explanations for covariation between fatherlessness and early maturation are required.

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Flexibility in reproductive timing in human females: integrating ultimate and proximate explanations

Cited by 121 publications

References 69 publications

Future Fertility in Low Fertility Countries

Future Fertility in Low Fertility Countries

Developmental influences on fertility decisions by women: an evolutionary perspective

Father's death does not affect growth and maturation but hinders reproduction: evidence from adolescent girls in post-war Estonia

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