Men’s Fertility: Trends, Correlates and Trajectories for Canadians

Zenaida R. Ravanera, University of Western Ontario
Fernando Rajulton, University of Western Ontario

This study will examine the level and timing of men’s fertility behaviour, the differentials in timing by socioeconomic characteristics and life course experiences, and the varying trajectories that men follow among the domains of fertility, marital unions, education and work. It will make use of data gathered through Statistics Canada’s 2001 General Social Survey on Family History and will focus on men born between 1921 to 1971. The level of fertility will be obtained by descriptive statistical techniques; the timing of fertility and parity progression ratios will be estimated through single decrement life tables; hazard models of analysis of the timings of fatherhood will be used to determine the factors that influence fertility; and, the trajectories covering fertility, marital union, education, and work states will be traced for birth cohorts, making use of LIFEHIST program particularly its non-Markovian technique of analysis.