Sibship size and status attainment across contexts: Evidence from the Netherlands, 1840-1925

Bras, Hilde; Kok, Jan; Mandemakers, Kees

doi:10.4054/demres.2010.23.4

Cited by 40 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Empirical studies have also confirmed that smaller family sizes in the demographic transition became increasing connected to socioeconomic upward mobility among children (Bras, Kok, and Mandemakers 2010;Van Bavel 2006, Van Bavel et al 2011. It may be expected that this shift toward increased investments in child quality would have occurred first among the higher status groups, partly because of the higher returns on education for people in higher status occupations, and partly because of the greater degree of knowledge and information about the new conditions among the members of these socioeconomic groups.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 73%

Social class and net fertility before, during, and after the demographic transition: A micro-level analysis of Sweden 1880-1970

Dribe¹,

Scalone²

2014

DemRes

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 73%

Social class and net fertility before, during, and after the demographic transition: A micro-level analysis of Sweden 1880-1970

Dribe¹,

Scalone²

2014

DemRes

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“…In the urban working class children’s labour contribution remained important longer and may have contributed to a delayed decline in fertility. Empirical studies have also confirmed that smaller family sizes in the demographic transition became increasingly connected to socioeconomic upward mobility for children (Van Bavel 2006; Bras et al 2010; Van Bavel et al 2011; Molitoris 2015).…”

Section: Theory and Previous Researchmentioning

confidence: 96%

Socio-economic status and fertility decline: Insights from historical transitions in Europe and North America

et al. 2016

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We have good knowledge of the timing of the historical fertility transitions in different regions, but we know much less regarding specific features and causes. In this study, we used longitudinal micro-level data for five local populations in Europe and North America to study the relationship between socioeconomic status and fertility during the transition. Using the same analytical model and identical class scheme, we examined the development of socioeconomic differences in marital fertility and related it to common theories on fertility behaviour. Our results do not provide support for the hypothesis of universally high fertility among the upper classes in pre-transitional society but support the idea that they acted as forerunners in the transition by reducing their fertility before other groups. Farmers and unskilled workers were latest to start to limit their fertility. Apart from this regularity, the patterns of class differences in fertility varied significantly among populations.

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“…The resources that can be assigned to each child in the household is, therefore, seen as dependent on the total amount of resources and the number of children (Downey, 2001). Although several scholars have uncovered extensive empirical evidence which is consistent with the resource-dilution model (Black, Devereux, & Salvanes, 2005;Booth & Kee, 2008;Downey, 1995;Dribe, Campbell, & Van Bavel, 2012;Steelman, Powell, Werum, & Carter, 2002), the number of empirical studies that challenge it is growing (Bras, Kok, & Mandemakers, 2010;Chu, Xie, & Yu, 2007;Li, Zhang, & Zhu, 2008;Lu & Treiman, 2008;Marteleto & de Souza, 2012;Shavit, Pierce, & Pierce, 1991;Yu, Su, & Chiu, 2012). These studies demonstrate that it is too simplistic to assume that the parental couple is the unit that decides on the distribution of resources.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Testing the conditional resource-dilution hypothesis: the impact of sibship size and composition on infant and child mortality in the Netherlands, 1863–1910

Riswick

2018

The History of the Family

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Child survival depends on the allocation of resources within the household. The size and composition of the sibling set influences parental division of resources and can in turn affect survival chances.In spite of recent advances in research on sibling effects, previous studies have often used the resource dilution hypothesis, which neglects the specific historical context which shapes household structure and organisation. This study therefore focuses specifically on the variation in historical context by examining sibling effects on infant and child mortality in three regions of the Netherlands in the period 1863-1910. It does so by connecting the gendered and the conditional resource-dilution model with each other as a conceptual framework. Changing household composition is taken into account by using longitudinal data from the Historical Sample of the Netherlands, time-varying variables and Cox proportional-hazard models to study sibling size and composition. The results show that the number and gender of siblings play an important role in determining child mortality, but are less significant in determining infant mortality. The number of same-sex siblings has a negative impact on boys' survival chances in the Netherlands, which suggests that after the age of one, boys experienced more competition from their brothers. The reason for this could be their assigned roles within the household and on the family farm. A negative influence of the number of sisters is only found for child mortality chances for girls in the nuclear northwest family region. Here, fewer children were needed to work inside or outside the household, and girls and boys may even have been interchangeable. The results underscore the importance of looking at the interaction between the specific historical context and gender when trying to understand how sibship size and composition influenced children's mortality risks and shaped inequality within the household. ARTICLE HISTORY

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Sibship size and status attainment across contexts: Evidence from the Netherlands, 1840-1925

Cited by 40 publications

References 38 publications

Social class and net fertility before, during, and after the demographic transition: A micro-level analysis of Sweden 1880-1970

Social class and net fertility before, during, and after the demographic transition: A micro-level analysis of Sweden 1880-1970

Socio-economic status and fertility decline: Insights from historical transitions in Europe and North America

Testing the conditional resource-dilution hypothesis: the impact of sibship size and composition on infant and child mortality in the Netherlands, 1863–1910

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