Analysis of the data from the tenth Italian census shows that women born to older fathers tend to marry older men. The correlations between the ages of the father and the husband in various situations were always found to be positive and significant when the age of the woman and her educational level were held constant. Correlation coefficients are higher in rural and economically less developed areas. Behavioural ‘imprinting’ is suggested as a possible explanation.

The part played by radio and television coverage of sport in developing public appreciation of sports is covered, and consideration is given to the responsibilities involved in dealing with sports in which violence occurs. The duties of the television producer in relation to the players, the viewers and the sponsors of sport are discussed.

Four special groups of women resident and obtaining abortions in one health district are described: women under 16 years and over 35 years, those undergoing a second or third abortion, and those obtaining operations later than 20 weeks gestation. These women rarely obtain adequate contraceptive advice and services, particularly when oral contraception has not proved to be suitable for them. It appears that some general practitioners do not offer a comprehensive family planning service and that this can result in women resorting to unreliable methods of birth control despite their demonstrated willingness to use contraception.

Among the very young, though most have received teaching about contraception, few appear to use any method; the confusion over the age of consent may be contributing to the failure of adults to make adequate provision for this group. The women over 35 years seemed to have little contact with family planning advice. There was a disturbing failure to meet the demand for sterilization until an unwanted pregnancy had occurred.

Patients undergoing a second or third abortion were frequently found to have contraceptive problems; there was no evidence that they were irresponsible as a group. A description of two patients obtaining operations after 20 weeks gestation illustrates the complexities of the late abortion issue. It is suggested that restrictive legislation cannot hope to contain the determination which may accompany the decision to seek abortion.

In a rural area of Bangladesh IUD acceptors in the 2 years prior to the introduction of a family planning health services programme differed from the women who accepted IUDs following the initiation of the programme. The pre-programme acceptors were older, higher parity women who were using IUDs to terminate childbearing, in contrast to the post-programme acceptors who were younger, lower parity women who were using IUDs to space the next pregnancy. The reasons for these differences are examined. The result of the programme has been a pronounced drop in the birth rate.

This study examines by multiple regression analysis the factors influencing district variation in infant mortality rate in Sri Lanka in a given year (1971). It shows that 83% of the district variation is explained by differences in the proportion of the population that is Indian Tamil, the proportion of female employees, and the proportion of females aged 15–19 with at least 5 years of education.

It is suggested that dizygotic twinning rates and fecundability are closely related and that the recent declines in dizygotic twinning rates may have been accompanied by declines in fecundability in developed societies. Records on twinning rates for many countries are readily accessible in national vital statistics; demographers may therefore find that changes in dizygotic twinning rates may be a useful monitor of changes in fecundability. The question arises whether this decline in fecundability has been responsible, to any appreciable extent, for the decline in birth rates experienced in recent years by developed countries.

Cumulative fertility as measured by deviation from the natural fertility schedule is determined more by intermediate variables such as child mortality, the use of supplementary food, lactation, and husband's absence, than by the practice of fertility control using modern contraceptive methods. Socioeconomic factors like education, urban residence and the possession of household assets, though differentiating these intermediate variables of fertility, do not have direct effects on cumulative fertility among the sample of Bangladeshi women in the Bangladesh Fertility Survey. The effect of age, controlling for the effect of these intermediate variables, remains strongly negative, suggesting an early onset of subfecundity. The implications of these findings for fertility trends and differentials in recent decades are discussed.

The authors compared 130 married abortion applicants with 100 married pregnant women who were attending the antenatal clinic. The abortion applicants were more likely to have had unhappy childhoods, broken homes, sexual pathology and more children. Their neuroticism scores on the Maudsley Personality Inventory were significantly higher. They tended to use either no contraception or unreliable methods. They were older and tended to report more socioeconomic problems. The characteristics of abortion applicants in this study seem to be similar to those reported from other countries.

In a retrospective study, the impact of breast-feeding on the survival probabilities of children born to women in hospitals in Cairo, Egypt, is estimated. The analysis shows that early cessation of breastfeeding is associated with higher mortality and the effects are more severe the lower the education level of the mother.

Evidence from a national sample of New Zealand adults demonstrates a high prevalence of obesity, including severe obesity. Maori subcutaneous fat distribution is different from white, the former having relatively greater subscapular than triceps skinfolds compared to whites. Obesity is more prevalent in Maori. In whites, higher educational attainment tends to be associated with lesser indices of obesity and greater stature. The obese do not appear to have greater dietary energy intakes, but are less likely to consume breakfast than the non-obese.

The hypothesis that women who experience accidental pregnancy are at risk for all types of accident has been examined to test indirectly the validity of a commonly postulated abortion personality profile. Identified women undergoing abortion in Odense, Denmark, were compared with non-abortion community women as to their registered incidence of accident-related trauma over a 2-year period. Age- and cause-specific accident rates were found not to vary significantly between the abortion and non-abortion groups of women.

A consecutive series of 1200 specimens of amniotic fluid obtained by amniocentesis from patients requesting antenatal diagnosis coming to a regional genetic advisory service is reviewed. The analysis identifies the conditions that most frequently come for antenatal diagnosis, picks out the conditions showing the highest frequency of affected fetuses on termination, and examines the success of the procedure as regards the accuracy of the genetic diagnosis and the ensuing normality of the pregnancy.

This paper examines the results of the 1971 Population Growth Survey in Pakistan and attempts to reassess the fertility and infant mortality levels utilizing some unpublished data on children ever born and proportion surviving. These adjusted fertility and infant mortality rates show that there has been hardly any decline in the fertility and infant mortality levels in Pakistan during the decade ending in 1971.

As part of a comparative analysis of uterine sibling groups to discover any evidence of ‘stopping rules’ related to actual preferences for children of one sex or another, the distribution of sequences of births by sex from a Ghanaian sample of 9392 mothers has been examined. No such rules can be detected.

Fourteen variables including socioeconomic factors, demographic variables, reproductive ideals and contact with family planning programmes are tested as correlates of contraceptive use among a low-income population of Cali, Colombia. Data from surveys in 1976 and 1978 show two factors to be key determinants: number of children and contact with the local contraceptive distribution post. The availability of family planning services is discussed as an important concern for policy makers.

The relationship between anthropometrics and three measures of Darwinian fitness—number of surviving children, number of living siblings and marital status—was sought in a population practising no contraception. The pattern suggestive of stabilizing selection was evident for one dimension, destabilizing selection for another dimension, and directional selection for yet another. The dimensions studied were those least intercorrelated one with another. Stabilizing selection for human physical characteristics may not be a universal phenomenon.

The relationship of completed fertility in West Malaysia to age at first birth, ethnic group, education, work experience and number of marriages is examined by multiple classification analysis. In each ethnic group, the net effect of age at first birth, after allowing for the remaining variables, is strong.

A wide ranging coverage is given of the issues involved in the interaction between women and sport. The pressures on girls and women to take part in or to refrain from various sports are considered. The question of the leisure time available to women in various situations, and the pressures on that leisure time, are discussed, and space is also given to the opportunities available at school level, the Equal Opportunities Commission's involvement in sport and the problems of sportswomen at the highest level.