Long-Term Parity-Specific Fertility Trends among Descendants of Immigrants in the United Kingdom

Jiseon Baek , University of St Andrews
Hill Kulu, University of St Andrews
Sarah Christison, University of St Andrews
Francesca Fiori, University of Strathclyde
Bernice Kuang, University of Southampton
Ann Berrington, University of Southampton

Recent decades in the United Kingdom have witnessed notable population shifts, with fertility trending downward and immigration flows increasing, resulting in a growing population of immigrant descendants. Yet, there remains limited understanding of the long-term fertility trends among these groups in the United Kingdom. Previous studies have either relied on aggregated fertility measures or focused on parity-specific fertility only within the majority population. It is important to examine the fertility behaviour of immigrant descendants further, since decisions about each birth may differ from those of the majority population and may reflect distinct tendencies that either change or persist over time. This study fills this gap by examining parity-specific fertility trends among women of immigrant descent in the United Kingdom between 1990 and 2017. It applies an event-history approach using the Office for National Statistics Longitudinal Study – English and Welsh register-based data. The findings demonstrate that fertility change among immigrant descendants is primarily driven by delayed entry into parenthood rather than changes in family size, revealing how education and minority status differently shape timing- and parity-specific fertility patterns. These results deepen understanding of fertility behaviour among minority populations by highlighting variations across descendant groups, thereby challenging the tendency to generalise fertility patterns based solely on the majority population.

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 Presented in Session P1. Families, Fertility, and the Life Course 1