Goisis Alice, Sigle-Rushton Wendy
Department of Social Policy, London School of Economics, London, UK,
Demography. 2014 Oct;51(5):1821-41. doi: 10.1007/s13524-014-0335-4.
Over the past several decades, U.S. fertility has followed a trend toward the postponement of motherhood. The socioeconomic causes and consequences of this trend have been the focus of attention in the demographic literature. Given the socioeconomic advantages of those who postpone having children, some authors have argued that the disadvantage experienced by certain groups would be reduced if they postponed their births. The weathering hypothesis literature, by integrating a biosocial perspective, complicates this argument and posits that the costs and benefits of postponement may vary systematically across population subgroups. In particular, the literature on the weathering hypothesis argues that, as a consequence of their unique experiences of racism and disadvantage, African American women may experience a more rapid deterioration of their health which could offset or eventually reverse any socioeconomic benefit of postponement. But because very few African American women postpone motherhood, efforts to find compelling evidence to support the arguments of this perspective rely on a strategy of comparison that is problematic because a potentially selected group of older black mothers are used to represent the costs of postponement. This might explain why the weathering hypothesis has played a rather limited role in the way demographers conceptualize postponement and its consequences for well-being. In order to explore the potential utility of this perspective, we turn our attention to the UK context. Because first-birth fertility schedules are similar for black and white women, we can observe (rather than assume) whether the meaning and consequences of postponement vary across these population subgroups. The results, obtained using linked UK census and birth record data, reveal evidence consistent with the weathering hypothesis in the United Kingdom and lend support to the arguments that the demographic literature would benefit from integrating insights from this biosocial perspective.
在过去几十年里，美国的生育率呈现出推迟生育的趋势。这一趋势的社会经济原因及后果一直是人口统计学文献关注的焦点。鉴于推迟生育者具有社会经济优势，一些作者认为，如果某些群体推迟生育，他们所经历的劣势将会减少。“累积劣势假说”文献通过整合生物社会视角，使这一观点变得复杂，并假定推迟生育的成本和收益可能在不同人口亚群体中存在系统性差异。特别是，关于“累积劣势假说”的文献认为，由于非裔美国女性独特的种族主义经历和劣势，她们的健康状况可能会更快恶化，这可能会抵消或最终扭转推迟生育带来的任何社会经济益处。但由于很少有非裔美国女性推迟生育，寻找有力证据来支持这一观点的努力依赖于一种比较策略，而这种策略存在问题，因为可能是经过挑选的老年黑人母亲群体被用来代表推迟生育的成本。这或许可以解释为什么“累积劣势假说”在人口统计学家对推迟生育及其对幸福感的影响的概念化过程中所起的作用相当有限。为了探究这一观点的潜在效用，我们将注意力转向英国的情况。由于黑人和白人女性的初育生育时间表相似，我们可以观察（而非假设）推迟生育的意义和后果在这些人口亚群体中是否存在差异。利用英国人口普查数据和出生记录数据得出的结果，揭示了与英国的“累积劣势假说”相符的证据，并支持了这样的观点，即人口统计学文献将受益于整合这一生物社会视角的见解。
