Population Council, New York.
Popul Dev Rev. 2012;38(1):83-120. doi: 10.1111/j.1728-4457.2012.00473.x.
Between 1998 and 2008 European countries experienced the first continent-wide increase in the period total fertility rate (TFR) since the 1960s. After discussing period and cohort influences on fertility trends, we examine the role of tempo distortions of period fertility and different methods for removing them. We highlight the usefulness of a new indicator: the tempo- and parity-adjusted total fertility rate (TFRp*). This variant of the adjusted total fertility rate proposed by Bongaarts and Feeney also controls for the parity composition of the female population and provides more stable values than the indicators proposed in the past. Finally, we estimate levels and trends in tempo and parity distribution distortions in selected countries in Europe. Our analysis of period and cohort fertility indicators in the Czech Republic, Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden shows that the new adjusted measure gives a remarkable fit with the completed fertility of women in prime childbearing years in a given period, which suggests that it provides an accurate adjustment for tempo and parity composition distortions. Using an expanded dataset for ten countries, we demonstrate that adjusted fertility as measured by TFRp* remained nearly stable since the late 1990s. This finding implies that the recent upturns in the period TFR in Europe are largely explained by a decline in the pace of fertility postponement. Other tempo-adjusted fertility indicators have not indicated such a large role for the diminishing tempo effect in these TFR upturns. As countries proceed through their postponement transitions, tempo effects will decline further and eventually disappear, thus putting continued upward pressure on period fertility. However, such an upward trend may be obscured for a few years by the effects of economic recession.
1998 年至 2008 年期间，欧洲国家的总和生育率（TFR）经历了自 20 世纪 60 年代以来的首次全洲范围内的增长。在讨论了生育趋势的时期和队列影响之后，我们研究了时期生育的时空调控偏差的作用以及消除这些偏差的不同方法。我们强调了一个新指标的有用性：时空调控和生育调整总和生育率（TFRp*）。这种由邦加茨和费尼提出的调整总和生育率的变体还控制了女性人口的生育模式组成，并提供了比过去提出的指标更稳定的值。最后，我们估计了选定欧洲国家的时期和生育模式分布偏差的水平和趋势。我们对捷克共和国、荷兰、西班牙和瑞典的时期和队列生育指标的分析表明，新的调整措施与特定时期生育高峰期女性的已完成生育率非常吻合，这表明它为时期和生育模式组成偏差提供了准确的调整。使用十个国家的扩展数据集，我们证明了 TFRp*衡量的调整生育率自 20 世纪 90 年代末以来几乎保持稳定。这一发现表明，欧洲近期总和生育率的上升在很大程度上是由于生育率推迟步伐的下降所致。其他时空调控生育率指标并没有表明在这些总和生育率上升中，时空调控效应有如此大的作用。随着各国进入生育推迟的过渡阶段，时空调控效应将进一步下降并最终消失，从而对时期生育率持续施加向上的压力。然而，经济衰退的影响可能会在未来几年内掩盖这种上升趋势。
