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Social influences on fertility at later ages of reproduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2011

Helen Ware
Helen Ware
Affiliation:
Department of Demography, AustralianNational University, Canberra, Australia
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Summary

This paper focuses upon the social factors regulating sexual behaviour and fertility in the later years of the female reproductive period. Information from India, Africa and Europe is presented on traditional beliefs and constraints concerning the cessation of procreation and the modification of sexual relations in middle age. Data showing the diversity of attitudes and practices in India, Bangladesh, Nigeria, the USA and Australia are discussed. Findings are that, in all the areas examined, coital frequency declines with advancing age although the timing and extent of the decline varies. However, the extent to which procreation is expected to cease prior to the onset of biological infecundity varies markedly even between neighbouring cultures at the same level of development. In Western cultures, for personal reasons, wives expect that childbearing should cease well before the onset of infecundity and can state an exact age at which this should occur. In those African and Asian cultures where there is a social limit to continued reproduction, this is most commonly defined in terms of a life-cycle stage attained by the family as a whole; chronological age is rarely of any importance.

Type
II. Fertility rates in middle age
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 11 , supplement S6: Fertility in Middle Age , 1979 , pp. 75 - 96
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1979

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