TY - JOUR
T1 - The Importance of Motherhood and Fertility Intentions among U.S. Women
AU - McQuillan, Julia
AU - Greil, Arthur L.
AU - Shreffler, Karina M.
AU - Bedrous, Andrew V.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The data for this article was supported by the National Institute for Child and Human Development Grant 1R01HD044144 01A1.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2014.
PY - 2015/3/8
Y1 - 2015/3/8
N2 - Fertility intentions are associated with achieved fertility; therefore, understanding the factors associated with fertility intentions is important. Considerable research has examined factors associated with fertility intentions, but no one has explored the importance of motherhood to women. Guided by life course and identity theories, we use the National Survey of Fertility Barriers, a data set collected from a random sample of U.S. women aged 25-45 in 2004 through 2007, to assess the relationship between importance of motherhood and fertility intentions. Adding importance of motherhood to a model including other variables associated with fertility intentions increases the variance explained by 6.4 percent. Importance of a motherhood identity mediates the association of fertility intentions with such demographic and social correlates of fertility intentions as gender attitudes, valuing leisure, valuing career, religiosity, and family pro-fertility messages. It is therefore helpful to explicitly include the importance of the motherhood identity in models of fertility intentions.
AB - Fertility intentions are associated with achieved fertility; therefore, understanding the factors associated with fertility intentions is important. Considerable research has examined factors associated with fertility intentions, but no one has explored the importance of motherhood to women. Guided by life course and identity theories, we use the National Survey of Fertility Barriers, a data set collected from a random sample of U.S. women aged 25-45 in 2004 through 2007, to assess the relationship between importance of motherhood and fertility intentions. Adding importance of motherhood to a model including other variables associated with fertility intentions increases the variance explained by 6.4 percent. Importance of a motherhood identity mediates the association of fertility intentions with such demographic and social correlates of fertility intentions as gender attitudes, valuing leisure, valuing career, religiosity, and family pro-fertility messages. It is therefore helpful to explicitly include the importance of the motherhood identity in models of fertility intentions.
KW - attitudes
KW - fertility intentions
KW - identity
KW - motherhood
KW - path model
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84930515220&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0731121414534393
DO - 10.1177/0731121414534393
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84930515220
SN - 0731-1214
VL - 58
SP - 20
EP - 35
JO - Sociological Perspectives
JF - Sociological Perspectives
IS - 1
ER -