Parents’ Preferences for Sex of Children in Sweden: Attitudes and Outcomes

Vitor Miranda, Johan Dahlberg and Gunnar Andersson
Additional contact information
Johan Dahlberg: Stockholm University Demography Unit
Gunnar Andersson: Stockholm University Demography Unit

Population Research and Policy Review, 2018, vol. 37, issue 3, No 5, 443-459

Abstract: Abstract It has been argued that preferences for the sex of children would be small or non‐existing in relatively gender equal societies. However, previous studies have suggested that a stronger preference for having daughter exists in Scandinavian countries, which are frequently noted for being among the most gender equal societies in the world. Combining new register data on birth rates by sex of the previous children and recent survey data on couples’ stated preferences for the sex of children, we show that the preference for daughters has increased in Sweden over the last decade. In addition to the stronger preference for having daughters among two‐child mothers documented in previous research, our findings show that during the previous decade this preference was noticeable also among one‐child parents. Despite Swedish society being known for holding gender equal social norms, interviewed parents openly expressed some degree of preference for having daughters over sons.

Keywords: Gender preference; Family formation; Birth rates; Sweden (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11113-018-9462-8 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:poprpr:v:37:y:2018:i:3:d:10.1007_s11113-018-9462-8

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... es/journal/11113/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11113-018-9462-8

Access Statistics for this article

Population Research and Policy Review is currently edited by D.A. Swanson

More articles in Population Research and Policy Review from Springer, Southern Demographic Association (SDA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().