ABSTRACT
This chapter examines recent fertility trends in Third World countries and discusses some of the origins and implications of those trends. In the Third World as a whole, excluding China, the total fertility rate (TFR) has fallen from about six children per woman in the mid-1960s to about four in the mid-1990s, a decline of one-third. Social, cultural, political, and economic factors affecting women's lives influence fertility indirectly, through one or more of the proximate determinants. Women's education is highly correlated with reduced fertility. The effect on fertility of rising age at marriage depends in part on how delayed marriage affects the reproductive behavior of young, unmarried people. The low status of women is no more clearly revealed than in son preference. Particularly in some Asian cultures, sons are still valued over daughters. Education decreases fertility by increasing women's economic options, information about and access to family planning, status, fertility preferences, and life choices.
