Abstract

PIP: Field investigation was conducted during 1976 to gather data on the fertility of currently married women in Chittagong city, Bangladesh, in relation to their husband's former residence. Both husband and wife were interviewed. Detailed information on fertility and socioeconomic variables were collected from 510 currently married women (under 50) who were living with their husbands at the time of the interview. The data on former residence were classified into 2 main groups: nonmigrants and migrants. In considering the migration status, the residence background of the husband was taken into account. The migrants were those who had stayed most of their lives outside Chittagong city before migrating there. The nonmigrants were those who were born in Chittagong city. Of the 510 currently married women interviewed, only 40 (7.8%) were urban migrants and as such it was considered more useful to merge them with the rural migrants who were 360 (70.6%). The mean number of children ever born for the nonmigrant women was 5.96, which was much higher than the corresponding value of 3.81 for the migrant women. The difference in mean number of children ever born between the nonmigrant and migrant women was statistically highly significant. The mean number of desired children for the nonmigrant women was 4.78; it was 3.99 for the migrant women. The difference in the mean number of desired children between the nonmigrant and migrant women also was statistically highly significant. The mean number of children ever born was consistently higher for nonmigrant women in all the age groups in comparison to migrant women in corresponding age groups. When fertility was standardized for the educational attainment of women, the original difference of mean number of children ever born between the nonmigrant and migrant groups was reduced to 0.59 child. The nonmigrant women were evenly distributed among the 3 socioeconomic groups, their percentages in poor, medium, and high socioeconomic status groups being 36%, 32%, and 32%, respectively. About 2/3 of the migrant women belonged to the high socioeconomic group; the remaining 1/3 were evenly distributed in the poor and medium socioeconomic groups. Thus, there was a clear indication that the migrants belong to a high aspirant group in terms of social achievement.