Social Background and the Demographic Life Course: Cross-National Comparisons

This open access book examines how childhood social disadvantage influences young-adult demographic decision-making and later-life economic and well-being outcomes. This book in particular focuses on testing whether the consequences of childhood social disadvantage for adult outcomes differ across societies, and whether these differences are shaped by the “context of opportunities” that societies offer to diminish the adverse impact of economic and social deprivation. The book integrates a longitudinal approach and provides new insights in how the experience of childhood disadvantage (e.g. low parental socio-economic status, family disruption) influences demographic decisions in adulthood (e.g. the timing of family-events such as cohabitation, marriage or parenthood; the risk of divorce or having a child outside a partner relationship; the exposure to later-life loneliness, poor health, and economic adversity). Moreover, using a cross-national comparative perspective it investigates whether the relationships of interest differ across nations, and tests the “context of opportunities” hypothesis arguing that the links between childhood disadvantage and adult outcomes are weakened in societal contexts offering good opportunities for people to escape situations of deprivation. To do so, the book analyzes national contexts based on economic prosperity, family values and norms, and welfare-state arrangements.

Chapter 1. Social Background and Adult Socio-Demographic Outcomes in a Cross-National Comparative Perspective: An Introduction.- Chapter 2. Cross-National Variation in the Link Between Parental Socio-Economic Status and Union Formation and Dissolution Processes.- Chapter 3. Nonmarital Fertility in Europe and North-America: What is the Role of Parental SES and Own SES?.- Chapter 4. The Persistent Influence of Socio-Economic Background on Family Formation Pathways and Disadvantage in Young Adulthood.- Chapter 5. Adding Well-Being to Ageing: Family Transitions as Determinants of Later-Life Socio-Emotional and Economic Well-Being.- Chapter 6. Meta-Analysis and Meta-Regression: An Alternative to Multilevel Analysis when the Number of Countries is Small.- Chapter 7. Modeling the Genesis of Life Courses.- Chapter 8. Understanding the Mechanisms of Intergenerational Social Inequality in Demographic Behavior.- Chapter 9. Explaining Cross-National Differences in Social Background Effects: What Have We Learned?.

Aart C. Liefbroer is Leader of the Theme Group on ‘Families and Generations’ and member of the Management Team at the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI), The Hague, Netherlands, professor of Life Course Demography at the University Medical Centre Groningen of the University of Groningen, Netherlands, and professor by special appointment of Demography of Young Adults and Intergenerational Transmission at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, Netherlands. He is interested in determinants and consequences of young adults’ demographic decisions.

Mioara Zoutewelle-Terovan is a researcher at the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI) and is affiliated with the University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands. She applies life-course concepts and theories to examine antecedents and consequences of young adults’ decisions concerning family life, work life and criminal engagement.