Gender ideology and fertility intentions across Europe

Gerda R. Neyer, Stockholm University
Daniele Vignoli, University of Florence
Trude Lappegård, Statistics Norway

There is an ongoing discussion about the relationship between gender attitudes and fertility intentions. In this paper we focus on three dimensions of gender: gender roles in the public sphere, mothers’ role in the family, and fathers’ role in the family. We make use of the first Generations and Gender Survey of eight Eastern and Western European countries, estimating the likelihood of planning for a(nother) child during the next three years for women and men separately. The results show that the relationship between gender ideology and childbearing intentions is a complex issue with extensive variation across gender role dimension, gender and societies. Generally, egalitarian attitudes towards gender roles in the public sphere and mothers´ role in the family have a negative association with childbearing intentions in the near future, while there is a more positive relationship between egalitarian attitudes towards father’s role in the family and childbearing intentions.