Abstract
This paper throws some light on changing family-building patterns in Sweden during the 1960s and 1970s. The family-building events analyzed are first informal cohabitation, first marriage, birth of first child (both outside a union and within a consensual union), and separations from childless informal cohabitation. Results from three previous studies are first summarized. These analyze the patterns by socio-economic and regional origin, applying multiple-decrement techniques separately for each background factor. The new results presented here are based on analyses that use multiplicative hazard models, permitting isolation of the effects of socio-economic background and region of childhood and adolescence respectively. It is generally found that socio-economic background is more important than the region where the woman grew up. Marriage intensities, however, which exhibit a clear regional pattern, are exceptions to this.
Résumé
Cet article est une contribution à l'étude de l'évolution du mode de formation de la famille en Suède dans les années 1960 et 1970. L'analyse porte sur les événements qui fondent la famille : la première union consensuelle, le premier mariage, la naissance du premier enfant (que la mère soit seule ou cohabitante), ainsi que sur la rupture d'une union consensuelle sans enfant. Les auteurs présentent brièvement les résultats de trois études antérieures qui analysent les structures du phénomène selon l'origine socio-économique et régionale de la femme, en appliquant des techniques d'extinction multiple pour chaque facteur pris isolément. Les nouveaux résultats présentés ici proviennent d'analyses qui recourent à des modèles de risques multiplicatifs, permettant d'isoler les effets respectifs de l'origine socio-économique de la femme et de la région où elle a vécu son enfance et son adolescence. En général, l'origine socio-économique se révèle plus significative que la région où la femme a grandi ; mais l'intensité du mariage fait exception, avec des différences régionales marquées.
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References
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This report is part of an ongoing research project in the Section of Demography, University of Stockholm, called ‘Life-cycle phases of Swedish women: a study of education, labour-force participation and childbearing among Swedish women born in 1936–60’, financed by the Swedish Council for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences and the Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation. Statistics Sweden kindly granted access to anonymized data from the Swedish Fertility Survey of 1981. The authors are grateful to Cecilia Etzler and Jan M. Hoem for valuable advice.
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Bernhardt, E., Hoem, B. Cohabitation and social background: Trends observed for Swedish women born between 1936 and 1960. Eur J Population 1, 375–395 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01797149
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01797149