Life-Course Patterns of Perceived Infertility and Number of Births: Evidence from German Panel Data

Arthur Greil , Alfred University
Desmond Wallace, Alfred University
Martin Bujard , Federal Institute for Population Research (BiB)
Jasmin Passet-Wittig , Federal Institute for Population Research, Germany
Michele Lowry, Alfred University
Julia McQuillan, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

We used eleven waves of data from the German Family Panel pairfam to examine the relationship between perceived infertility and number of births over time. We used a three-category measure of perceived infertility (1) never perceived infertility, (2) perceived infertility once or twice and (3) perceived infertility three times or more. Because the dependent variable, number of biological children, was a count variable, we estimated the models using negative binomial regression. We used xtnbreg in Stata with a polynomial time function to estimate all models. We conducted separate analyses by cohort (1971-73, 1981-83), gender, and initial parity (0, 1+) to assess whether the association between perceived inability to procreate and number of children differed among these core demographic groups. As expected, individuals with no children in the first who never perceived infertility or who perceived infertility once or twice went on to have significantly more biological children than those who perceived an inability to procreate more often. Contrary to expectations, individuals with parity 1 in the first wave who perceived infertility three times or more actually went on the have more children than individuals in the other groups. This result could be due either to small sample sizes in some of the Parity1 analyses or to a tendence on the part of those who often perceive infertility to try harder to have a baby. Thus, the relationship between perceived inability to procreate and achieved fertility may depend on the accumulation of these perceptions across multiple waves of data.

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 Presented in Session P1. Postercafe