Attitudes, Norms and Perceived Behavioural Control: Explaining Fertility Intentions in Bulgaria

Attitudes, normes et contrôle perçu du comportement: Une explication des intentions de fécondité en Bulgarie

Francesco Billari, Dimiter Philipov and Maria Rita Testa
Additional contact information
Dimiter Philipov: Austrian Academy of Sciences
Maria Rita Testa: Austrian Academy of Sciences

European Journal of Population, 2009, vol. 25, issue 4, No 5, 439-465

Abstract: Abstract In this article, we study fertility decision-making through timing parity-progression intentions. The theoretical framework builds on Ajzen’s social-psychological “Theory of Planned Behavior”: intentions are seen as directly dependent on three components: attitudes, norms and perceived behavioural control. We study the case of Bulgaria, a “lowest-low” fertility country. In 2002, a sample survey containing a specially designed module was conducted. This module included an implementation of our framework, with a special attention to the links between normative pressure and the social network of respondents. Results show that the three components are broadly predictive of fertility intentions. More specifically, attitudes are more relevant than norms for higher parities. Socio-economic, ideational, psychological and social capital-based factors are relevant background determinants.

Keywords: Fertility intentions; Theory of planned behavior; Bulgaria; Lowest-low fertility; Norms; Intentions de fécondité; Théorie du comportement prévu; Bulgarie; Très basses fécondités; Normes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (61)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10680-009-9187-9 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:eurpop:v:25:y:2009:i:4:d:10.1007_s10680-009-9187-9

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10680

DOI: 10.1007/s10680-009-9187-9

Access Statistics for this article

European Journal of Population is currently edited by Helga A.G. de Valk

More articles in European Journal of Population from Springer, European Association for Population Studies
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().