Male and Female Fertility, How Different Can They Be?

Paul Stupp, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
Ramon Enamorado, Ashonplafa

This research is motivated by a recent set of household surveys conducted in Honduras in 1996 and 2001. At both points in time, independent samples of females ages 15-49 and males ages 15-59 were interviewed. For the females, the estimated period total fertility rate declined from 4.8 in 1993-1995 to 4.4 in 1998-2000. For the males the estimated period TFR remained almost constant (4.9 in 1993-95 and 5.0 in 1998-2000). This has thrown into doubt the quality of the birth history data for the male survey conducted in 2001. Before concluding the data are at fault, however, we propose to consider the question of whether male and female period fertility can be expected to be similar or different. We propose to do this by examining changes in cohort fertility over time and disaggregating cohort fertility into marital fertility and age at first union.