The influence of child spacing on child survival

Summary This study evaluates the strength of the influence of spacing on child survival. Data related to a traditional culture (Punjab) in which almost all children are breast-fed up to the age of 17 months. An initial pregnancy history survey, subsequent four years updating through continuous monitoring of vital events and a second cross-sectional pregnancy history survey at the mid-point provided a file containing information on pregnancies and survival of children of 5,018 women. The analysis first looks at the correlation between the lengths of the preceding and subsequent intervals of index children, then examines whether this correlation was related to the repeated pattern of child death or survival. Next, the influence of the duration of the preceding interval on the survival of the index child in general and after accounting for the fate of the preceding child were considered. Then the influence of the length of the subsequent interval on the survival of the index child after conception and after the birth of the next child were studied. Lastly, regression analyses with preceding and subsequent intervals as independent variables and age-specific survival or death as the dependent variable were performed.     

Family composition preferences in a developing culture: The case of Taiwan, 1973

Abstract As fertility comes increasingly under voluntary control in a developing society, it can be argued that individual desires or preferences about children will become more salient and more significant for eventual fertility. Hence, the study of preferences is increasingly important as contraceptive use is extended and results in decreasing the number of unwanted births.(1) Further changes in fertility then depend on changes in preferences. The assumption is that people will at least try to achieve the families they want, if the means to do so are available. The fact that contraception is used at all is some evidence of the soundness of this assumption, although it should be recognized that family size desires operate in a complex of preferences, under varying degrees of conflict and control. To expect a one-to-one relationship between attitudes or preferences and overt behaviour would be simplistic.     

Differences in white-nonwhite community mental health center service utilization patterns

Routinely collected computerized data were used to study the process of service delivery in terms of admission patterns, type and quantity of services rendered, and status at termination for whites and nonwhites in two community mental health centers. Social area analysis techniques were employed to control for socio-economic status, ethnicity and life style variables, and an epidemiologic model was used to analyze admission and service delivery rate differences. It was found that nonwhite admission rates were at least twice as great as white rates. Service delivery rates to the population at large were considerably greater for nonwhites than for whites. Delivery of direct services within the centers differed for whites and nonwhites, but no consistent trends emerged when types and amounts of services rendered were analyzed, controlling for sex, ethnicity, age, diagnosis and social area. Disruption of care indices were greater for nonwhites than for whites. Highlighted were some of the complexities involved in interpreting results of utilization studies.     

Setting health priorities: a review of concepts and approaches

The setting of health priorities is primarily concerned with the equitable distribution of resources and is now more than ever an important part of strategic planning within the National Health Service (NHS). The basic information which can be used to assist in such decision-making and the process by which different agencies become involved are important aspects of priority-setting; this article is based on a major review of the research literature on these aspects and provides a discussion and an analysis of experience within health and other fields. From this material a number of possible approaches to priority-setting are identified and discussed. The article concludes that, before it can be decided how priorities should be set in the future, outstanding questions about how far rational approaches are feasible, about who is to be involved and what role they should play, and about how far such decisions are to be taken nationally or locally will need further consideration.     

Optimal Times to Contact Sample Households

Finding a suitable respondent at home is an essential and expensivecomponent of a household survey. This article reports on theresults of a study of the probabilities of finding someone aged14 or older at home and discusses the application of such datato survey design and budgeting.     

Social forecasting: An integral part of corporate planning?

The increasing need for business to monitor the social dimensions of its environment and, hopefully make some forecasts of future trends has met with some constructive response from academics and consultants although not as yet on a very liberal scale. The published literature does not indicate to what extent companies in general attemp social forecasting and, where they do, the degree of integration which exists within their corporate planning systems. The authors, therefore, decided to survey a sample of British organizations to see if they could shed some light on these issues and thereby add some information to the excellent accounts of individual cases of social forecasting in, they suspect, the more advanced and atypical companies. The survey suggests a general picture of: awareness of the value of social forecasting; fairly widespread ignorance of the techniques which do exist, primitive though these may largely be; successful integration of social forecasting into the corporate planning systems of a substantial number of organizations but not in the majority.     

Further research in theories of population being carried out]

The 2nd Chinese Scientific Symposium on Theories of Population was held in Chengdu, Sichuan, on December 7-13, 1979. The symposium was jointly sponsored by the Department of Family Planning of the Chinese Central Government, Chinese Academy of Sociology, Sichuan Provincial Revolutionary Committee (SPRC), and the Institute of Population Theories of the Chinese People's University (IPT). There were 255 attendants, representing 60 academic institutions, 14 scientific research organizations and 31 provincial, municipal, and autonomous regional departments of family planning. The main theme of the meeting was "Population Problems and Their Solutions Facing the Four Modernizations in China." 147 papers were read at the meeting. The meeting opened with a welcoming speech by Comrade Liu Haiquan, Vice-Chairman of SPRC, who pointed out the challenge Chinese family planners would face in advocating the 1 child family policy. Long speeches were made by Comrade Chen Dao who stressed the training of workers for Chinese population research and by Comrade Du Xinyuan (secretary of SPRC) who summarized results on recent family planning efforts in Sichuan. During the meeting, based on their contents, the papers were divided into 7 groups for separate discussions: 1) population development in the socialistic society, 2) relationship between population and economic developments and between population control and the 4 modernizations in China, 3) possible population problems in China, their nature, etiology and methods of solution, 4) population policies and family planning in China, 5) trends in population development and population planning in China, 6) problems of population distribution in China, and 7) development of population theories in China during the past 30 years. The meeting discussions were summarized by Comrade Liu Zheng of IPT who noted that there were 84 more attendants and 110 more papers in this meeting than the first held in 1978.     

A study on mortality rates and expectation of life at birth in demography]

An "age-time-area diagram" (referred to as a-t diagram) which is used as the basis for discussing different used and applications of variously defined mortality rates, as well two kinds of measurements for life expectancy is proprosed. The proposal is built upon the Lexis diagram. The a-t diagram is used to define a new way of measuring child mortality, projecting population, and proposing a formula for measuring successive and nonsuccessive life expectancy.     

Regional patterns of nuptiality in Europe, 1870-1960

Abstract This paper is a study of changes in nuptiality by province in Europe between 1870 and 1960: nuptiality is measured by I(m) a summary measure of the proportions married among women of childbearing age. In each of the approximately 500 provinces of Europe the level of nuptiality increased between 1870 and 1960. In addition, in most countries the differences among provinces diminished over the period, so that the countries were more homogeneous with respect to provincial nuptiality in 1960 than they had been in 1870. Despite this tendency to convergence, traditional regional differences, linked to a common regional history, were often maintained, though within a narrower range.