Arezoo Bagheri; Mahsa Saadati
Abstract
Background: A set of economic and social rules and regulations as well as cultural factors influence value of children; however, this value itself could alter fertility behaviors. The present study aimed at investigating the influence of the value of children on fertility behavior through considering ...
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Background: A set of economic and social rules and regulations as well as cultural factors influence value of children; however, this value itself could alter fertility behaviors. The present study aimed at investigating the influence of the value of children on fertility behavior through considering the impact of its attitudinal factors on childbearing desire, as one of the most important dimensions of fertility behavior.
Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted on 6231 females from 31 provinces of Iran, admitted to public health and treatment centers to vaccinate their children, during year 2014. The data collection tool was a questionnaire, including three value of children dimensions, including cultural (five items), social (seven items), and economic (four items) factors, and also demographic and attitudinal questions.
Results: Data were analyzed using SPSS-17 software and the factors influencing childbearing desire (CD) were examined by four SEMs for four age groups in AMOS-22. Goodness of fit models was confirmed by five fit indices. Only cultural factors had a significant direct effect on CD for 30 to 39 and 40 to 49 year-old females (P-values = 0.027, and < 0.001, respectively).
Conclusions: Thus, planners and policy makers should consider changes in the cultural value of children to implement successful policies to alter the current decreasing trend of fertility rate.
Samira Behboudi Gandevani; Saideh Ziaee; Farideh Khalajabadi Farahani
Abstract
Context: Cash payments or other incentive policies to improve population growth rate have been used for many years; but the efficiency of these policies has not yet been fully understood. We provide a brief background to different incentive population policies for accelerating birth rate and its underlying ...
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Context: Cash payments or other incentive policies to improve population growth rate have been used for many years; but the efficiency of these policies has not yet been fully understood. We provide a brief background to different incentive population policies for accelerating birth rate and its underlying rationale and consequences.
Evidence Acquisition: For our search strategy, we reviewed the J store, Medline, science direct, ISI database, and the WHO Reproductive Health Library. The study comprised all published and unpublished accounts on cash and other incentive programs, with especial reference to key considerations on the use of these policies. The majority of studies have been conducted in developed countries and policies are focused on addressing basic factors such as women’s decision making on childbearing, poverty, or western life style.
Results: In general, there are four different types of incentive policy instruments that can potentially influence childbearing: direct cash payments such as baby bonus payments and family allowances, indirect transfers such as tax exemptions, housing policies, health care or child tax credits, creating better working conditions for mothers like improving work–family compatibility such as maternity and paternity leave with or without salary-maintenance, or availability, acceptability, accessibility of high quality and inexpensive nursery in the workplace, and inadvertent policies such as new graduate recruitment system which help young people find regular jobs, and schools could act as go-betweens in the recruitment process since employers prefer hiring recent graduates.
Conclusions: We conclude that policies aimed at reducing the incompatibility between work and the factors associated with mothers' roles such as maternity leaves, childcare, and early education affecting women’s childbearing and younger age pregnancies. However, ongoing researches will shed more light on the efficacy of each incentive policies in the context of Iran.
