A Cognitive–Social Model of Fertility Intentions
Open accessAbstract
We examine the use and value of fertility intentions against the backdrop of theory and research in the cognitive and social sciences. First, we draw on recent brain and cognition research to contextualize fertility intentions within a broader set of conscious and unconscious mechanisms that contribute to mental function. Next, we integrate this research with social theory. Our conceptualizations suggest that people do not necessarily have fertility intentions; they form them only when prompted by specific situations. Intention formation draws on the current situation and on schemas of childbearing and parenthood learned through previous experience, imbued by affect, and organized by self‐representation. Using this conceptualization, we review apparently discordant knowledge about the value of fertility intentions in predicting fertility. Our analysis extends and deepens existing explanations for the weak predictive validity of fertility intentions at the individual level and provides a social‐cognitive explanation for why intentions predict as well as they do. When focusing on the predictive power of intentions at the aggregate level, our conceptualizations lead us to focus on how social structures frustrate or facilitate intentions and how the structural environment contributes to the formation of reported intentions in the first place. Our analysis suggests that existing measures of fertility intentions are useful but to varying extents and in many cases despite their failure to capture what they seek to measure.
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- Authors
- Bachrach, C. A., & Morgan, S. P.
- Affiliations
- Maryland Population Research Center (US)
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (US)
- Venue
- Population and Development Review
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2013-09
- Volume
- 39
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 459-485
- ISSN
- 0098-7921 (ISSN-L)
- 1728-4457
- PMC
- PMC4132897
- OpenAlex
- W2035730670
- Cited by
- 259
- References
- 88
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 33 · 2024: 32 · 2023: 21 · 2022: 19 · 2021: 27 · 2020: 15 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 37 · 2017: 16 · 2016: 12 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 2
- FWCI
- 27.25
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Population and Development Review (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) (submittedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- UNC Libraries
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health (2r24hd050924-06)
- Social Science Research Institute, Duke University
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R24 HD-050924)
- Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (R24HD050924, HD050924)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Demography › Family Dynamics and Relationships
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Reproductive Health and Contraception
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Reproductive Medicine › Reproductive Health and Technologies
- Keywords
- fertility intentions, intention formation, cognitive mechanisms, unconscious processes, schemas, childbearing, parenthood, self-representation, affect, social structure, social cognitive theory
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