Survey of recently married couples was carried out in Reading, Berkshire, UK in 1974. Its purpose was to provide information about the geographical and social origins of marriage partners, and to show how the town's social and geopraphical features might influence marital choice.

A list marriage certificate was preferred to the electoral register as a sample frame. Despite a lower than usual response rate the method was judged successful. Basic data on the geographical distribution of the husband and wife are given here, together with the fitting of the aggregate frequency distribution of distances to the log-normal distribution and their summary description in terms of the geometric means.

From pedigree analysis of a sample of 214 Orcadians, inbreeding levels are high by comparison with limited dada for Britain. The mean inbreeding coefficient is 0.001834, with a zero baseline taken as 1750. There appears little secular change for subject born over the period 1879–1940. Local variations occur within Orkney, and possible reasons for these are suggested.

Consanguinity is studied in a large sample of marriages among Dhangars of Maharashtra, India. The 22 endogamous castes included in the study show great variation in incidence, about an overall frequency of 26.4%. Matrilateral first cross-cousin unions are more frequency than patrilateral, and maternal uncle-niece nuions least frequent. Geograbhical differences are conspicuous, and all three types of consanguineous union show characteristic patterns; matrilateral unions increase in frequncy northwards, patrilateral and uncle-niece decrease northwards. The inbreeding levels among the Dhangars are high compared to other Maharashtrian groups, but substantially lower than in southern Dravidian speaking groups.

One hunderd and forty 'normal' children aged 0—5 years, selected from three large general medical practices to represent a wide socioeconomic range, were seen monthly for periods of at least one year. Average growth patterns, previously shown to be related to the energy value of diets, conformed to British standards. Height and weight were not significantly related to socioeconomic status, maternal 'efficiency', number of sibs nor place in family. About half the children aged 0.5 years or less changed growht 'channels', falling to 0.4% in children aged 2 years or more. Respiratory illnesses showed seasonal changes, but growth rates did not, and there was no evidence that illness of any kind or severity had more than a transient effect on growth rates. Developmental test scores were not found to be related to growth rates. Girls tended to have higher scores than boys. Children from non-manual families and those with sїbs at least 5 years older scored more highly in tests of language than those in other types of family.

Reported age at first coitus was shown to be associated with incidence and degree of infertility. Infertility patients reported later first coital ages than gynaecological patients in a sample of 792 women seen in a major infertility service. Among the infertility patients, those who had never conceived presented a later first coital age than those who had previously conceived. Routine gynaecological patients reported the youngest first coital age of the groups studied.

Data from an urban sample of American women of reproductive ages demonstrate that age at menarche is correlated with age at first intercourse, that age at first intercourse is correlated with age at first pregnancy, and that age at menarche is therefore correlated with age at first pregnancy. This applies to both blacks and whites when examined for the early years of the reproductive cycle. Girls with early menarche, compared to those with late menarche, are more than twice as likely to have had intercourse by age 16, and almost twice as likely to have given birth or had a pregnancy terminated by age 18. It is therefore useful to think of the timing of meanarche as an indicator of the probability of early intercourse and early childbearing.

This paper illustrates the application of increment—decrement life table methods to the study of family building patterns among women. Here age at the oocurrence of a specified birth is considered the principal duration variable. Data from a sample of currently married women from the 1965 US National Fertility Study were used to illustrate the method.

Fertility trends for Korean populations in Japan and Korea and for Japanese have been examinated, with special reference to the Fire-Horse or White-Horse year, 1966.

Koreans in Japan and the Japanese showed a remarkable drop in crude birth rates and a sharp increase in stillbirth rates in 1966, while Koreans in Korea showed only a steady decline in crude birth rate.

It was concluded that the Japanese folk superstition of Hinoe-Uma influenced the crude birth rates and stillbirth rates of both Japanese and Koreans in Japan 1966 and that the fertility behaviour of these Koreans had come to resemble that of the Japanese through the effect of environment factors in Japanese society.

In rural Bangladesh, early fetal wastage and stillbirth are higher among pregnancy orders one and six or higher than among orders two and three. The increased risk is particularly apparent among those pregnancies following two or more previous fetal deaths. Woman in the higher pregnancy orders who have not experienced previous fetal deaths or only one fetal death have only a slight increase in the risk of fetal death compared to women in pregnancy orders two and three. The virtual absence of obstetric care and the high maternal mortality in this Bengali population may allow only woman without reproductive impairmetns to reach the higher pregnancy orders.

A programme of artificial insemination, using donor semen, within the NHS began in Nottingham in 1975. Since the inception of the programme all couples have been interviewed by a senior medical social worker, either at home or, later in the programme, within the clinics. This paper reports on features including education, employment, relationship to fertility status, relationship to parents and childhood, religion and reaction to adoption or fostering from the first 147 couples interviewed. All couples have stated a willingness for follow-up assessments and further studies are planned to review their marriages and psychological make-up in later years.