Abstract

PIP: This study examined the relationship between household type and fertility among married women ages 15-44 years in Maharashtra. The data were drawn from a 1970 all-India Family Planning Survey. Demographic transition theory stresses the role of household type as a determinant of fertility, asserting that extended households can be expected to have higher fertility than nuclear households. However, as has been the case in numerous other studies, the analysis of the Maharashtra data indicates a higher lifetime fertility for women residing in nuclear households. Among young women at the initial stages of family building, nuclear households had 59% more births and 62% more surviving children than extended households. At older ages, women in extended households tend to catch up and had about 15% fewer children than women in nuclear households. Among the youngest women, those residing in nuclear households had an average of 1.25 children in the past 5 years, which was 38% more than their counterparts in extended households. Neither differential levels of natural fertility, family size preferences, education, nor use of fertility regulation explain the higher fertility of nuclear households. On the other hand, the data support the argument that household type is a function of fertility and of stage of the life cycle. As such, fertility is a better determinant of household type than a function of household type.