Women Who Delay Childbearing: Going beyond a Simple Demographic Profile

Gladys M. Martinez, National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Stephanie J. Willson, National Center for Health Statistics, CDC

In the past two decades, women in the United States have been bearing children at older ages. While in 1970 three percent of first births were to women aged 30-34, by 1996 sixteen percent of first births were to women in this age group (Ventura, 1999). Although their rate of childbearing stabilized in the 1990’s (Ventura, 1999), women ages 30 to 39 continue to have their first child at higher rates than they did in the 1970's. Delayed childbearing is important to understand because women who delay may have more health risks. For example, they may experience diminished fecundity which often results in their having either no children or fewer children than intended (Menken et al., 1986; Te Velde & Pearson, 2002). Once pregnant, older women have a higher risk of pregnancy loss, pre-term delivery, low birth weight babies, and even infant and maternal mortality (e.g., Cnattingius et al., 1992; Fidler & Bernstein, 1999; Harker & Thorpe, 1992; Martin et al., 2002; Matthews, et al., 2002). The growing number of women who delay childbearing may result in an increased demand for information and health care services targeted towards this group (e.g., infertility information and treatment). Women who delay childbearing tend to be white, highly educated, in professional occupations, and have above-average incomes (Soloway & Smith, 1987; McFalls, 1991; Morgan & Chen, 1992; Heck et al., 1997; Smith et al., 2001). In this project we go beyond previous research by using a more recent and complex data set, which allows us to paint a more detailed picture of delayers compared to younger first-time mothers. The data used in this analysis come from Cycle 5 of the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics in 1995. The data were collected from a nationally representative sample of non-institutionalized women between the ages of 15 and 44. The Cycle 5 response rate was 79%, resulting in a total sample of 10, 847 women. Among these, about 5,100 were women ages 30 to 44. The NSFG data are especially appropriate for this analysis because the survey was designed to collect information on factors affecting pregnancy and childbearing in the United States, including topics on women’s reproductive health. We define delayers as women who report having their first child between ages 30 and 44. In 1995 fourteen percent, or 3.5 million women, were delayers. Preliminary results suggest several differences between delayers and younger primiparas. First, where women live is related to whether they become delayers or not. Women from the Northeast and West are more likely to postpone childbearing than women from the Midwest and South (chart 1). This may be linked to differences in the educational attainment and racial and ethnic composition of these regions. Second, there is a connection between how important religion is in a woman’s life and her likelihood of being a delayer. As illustrated in chart 2, women who report that religion is not important in their lives are more likely to defer childbearing than women who report that religion is either somewhat or very important in their lives. Third, the amount of time a women spends in the labor force is also related to whether or not she will be a delayer. Using NSFG’s work history data, we calculated the total number of months women spent in the labor force since age 18. Chart 3 shows that women who had the most work experience were more likely to be delayers compared to women who had the least amount of work experience. Lastly, previous studies have found that children of teenage mothers are more likely to be teen parents than the children of older mothers (Furstenberg et al., 1990; Manlove, 1997; Hardy et al., 1998). We find a similar relationship with delayed childbearing; women whose mothers were delayers are more likely to be delayers themselves. Chart 4 shows that one in five women whose mothers postponed childbearing until age 30 or older were delayers. In contrast fewer than one in ten women whose mothers had their first birth before age 20 were delayers. In conclusion, this poster will compare the demographic profile of women who delay childbearing to those who had children at younger ages. The preliminary data presented here suggest that the profile of women who delay childbearing is more complex than other data sources are able to capture. Because of the significant increase in the number of delayers in the United States, further work on understanding this trend is imperative.