Theory and explanation in demography: The case of low fertility in Europe.

In the 50th anniversary edition of Population Studies, John Hobcraft commented that demographers spend too little time trying to explain the phenomena they measure and describe. A quarter of a century on, this paper looks at the state of theory and explanation in contemporary demography. I ask how demographers have approached the task of explanation since Hobcraft's comment, grounding the discussion in the mainstream literature on low fertility in Europe. Using selected examples, I critically review macro- and micro-level approaches to explanation, highlighting some of the philosophical problems that each encounters. I argue that different conceptions of what demography is, and the explanatory language fertility researchers use, lead to differences in explanatory strategies that are rarely explicitly recognized. I also consider how critical theories challenge demographers to think in new ways. Despite the increasing attention paid to theory and explanation, I conclude that more engagement with the philosophy of social sciences is needed before fertility researchers can legitimately claim their studies do as much to explain and understand as to quantify and describe.

Engaged parenting, gender, and children's time use in transnational families: An assessment spanning three global regions.

Global circuits of migration regularly separate parents from children. How families navigate this separation has changed markedly. The sharp decline in the cost of international communication makes possible new forms of transnational parenting. In many contexts, migrants are now actively engaged parents, involved in decisions, knowledgeable of children's schooling, employment, and activities, and in some cases, even conversant face-to-face with children via videoconferencing. These practices, however, are not universal. We use data from surveys in three countries to document the frequency and variability of intensive, engaged transnational parenting in the diverse global regions of Asia, Africa, and the Americas. We then ask whether the organisation of children's lives-specifically, time allocated to school homework, leisure, and household chores-varies by the degree to which migrant parents stay connected to sending homes. The gender of the migrant parent, stay-behind caregiver, and the gender of the child emerge as explanatory factors for engaged parenting and children's time use. However, and unexpectedly, in the Philippines, migrant mothers are less likely to practice engaged parenting. In sending households, girls in two of the three countries spend more time doing household chores than boys, but parental migration does not mitigate this difference. Although we find some evidence of more traditional gender practices, we also find exceptions that suggest potentially fruitful avenues for future research.

Does Having a Migrant Parent Reduce the Risk of Undernutrition for Children Who Stay Behind in South-East Asia?

Many parents from South-East Asia who go overseas to work are motivated by a desire to secure a better future for their children, yet the health consequences for children who stay behind are poorly understood. This study is the first cross-country comparison to explore the relationships between parental migration and the risk of undernutrition (stunting) for primary school-aged children. The analysis uses data from the CHAMPSEA Project for children aged 9 to 11 years in the Philippines (N = 480) and Vietnam (N = 482). A series of logistic regression models compares outcomes for children living in transnational households and children living with both parents in non-migrant households in the same communities. We find no general advantage of having a migrant parent. Rather there is a reduced risk of stunting only for some left-behind children in the Philippines, whereas having a caregiver with low educational attainment is a major risk factor for all children. The findings point to a complex set of relationships between parental migration and child nutrition, possibly reflecting differential opportunities for accumulating household wealth through overseas earnings. Moreover, differences between the two countries caution against generalizing across national or cultural groups. We conclude by considering the implications of the findings for theories of transnationalism and for the UN Millennium Development Goal of reducing childhood undernutrition.

Alcohol Use among Very Early Adolescents in Vietnam: What Difference Does Parental Migration Make?

Little is known about the patterns of alcohol use among adolescents and the transmission of alcohol use behaviors from parents to children, including the passage into responsible and problem drinking, in the developing world. The following paper uses primary data from the Child Health and Migrant Parents in South-East Asia (CHAMPSEA) Project for older children aged 9, 10 and 11 to examine the prevalence (16.2 percent) and correlates of alcohol use initiation including parental migration status, caregiving arrangements and exposure to environmental alcohol use (family and friends) in Vietnam. Contrary to expectations, there is no observed migrant 'deficit.' There is some indication that early adolescents in the care of their grandparents are less likely to have a history of experimentation with alcohol use, although it is fully attenuated after controlling for other factors. Peer use is the most powerful explanatory measure of early adolescent drinking, with early adolescents more than five times as likely to have ever drunk alcohol if their friends drink also, and as expected, there is a strong child gender difference with girls much less likely to have a history of alcohol use. "A man without alcohol is like a flag without wind"- Popular Vietnamese saying.

Resilience and well-being among children of migrant parents in South-East Asia.

There has been little systematic empirical research on the well-being of children in transnational households in South-East Asia-a major sending region for contract migrants. This study uses survey data collected in 2008 from children aged 9, 10, and 11 and their caregivers in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam (N=1,498). Results indicate that while children of migrant parents, especially migrant mothers, are less likely to be happy compared to children in nonmigrant households, greater resilience in child well-being is associated to longer durations of maternal absence. There is no evidence for a direct parental migration effect on school enjoyment and performance. The analyses highlight the sensitivity of results to the dimension of child well-being measured and who makes the assessment.

Transnational families and the family nexus: perspectives of Indonesian and Filipino children left behind by migrant parent(s).

As a significant supplier of labour migrants, Southeast Asia presents itself as an important site for the study of children in transnational families who are growing up separated from at least one migrant parent and sometimes cared for by 'other mothers'. Through the often-neglected voices of left-behind children, we investigate the impact of parental migration and the resulting reconfiguration of care arrangements on the subjective well-being of migrants' children in two Southeast Asian countries, Indonesia and the Philippines. We theorise the child's position in the transnational family nexus through the framework of the 'care triangle', representing interactions between three subject groups- 'left-behind' children, non-migrant parents/other carers; and migrant parent(s). Using both quantitative (from 1010 households) and qualitative (from 32 children) data from a study of child health and migrant parents in Southeast Asia, we examine relationships within the caring spaces both of home and of transnational spaces. The interrogation of different dimensions of care reveals the importance of contact with parents (both migrant and nonmigrant) to subjective child well-being, and the diversity of experiences and intimacies among children in the two study countries.

'Geraniums (red) and Delphiniums (blue)': Trauma, Ethics, and Medical Communications.

More official complaints about medical treatment in the UK relate to poor communications than to wrong diagnoses. This article, in considering the importance of communications training for clinicians, is structured into three sections. From use of a story that introduces the idea of miscommunication and trauma in the first section, the article moves, in the second, to a theorisation of trauma as a concept, addressing issues of intersubjectivity, the relationship between embodied and psychological being, and ethics. From this, the third section engages directly with medical communications training, exemplifying a particular literary-studies approach to matters of communication.

Choosing to Remain Childless? A Comparative Study of Fertility Intentions Among Women and Men in Italy and Britain.

Pathways to childlessness may differ not only between individuals but also at the population level. This paper investigates differences in childlessness by comparing two countries-Britain and Italy-where levels of childlessness are high in comparison with many other European countries, but which have distinct fertility trajectories and family regimes. Using data from two large, representative national samples of women and men of reproductive age in a co-residential partnership, it presents a rich analysis of the characteristics associated with intended childlessness, net of the aspects associated with being childless at interview. Although childlessness intentions are generally comparable between men and women of the same age, results show a link between socio-economic disadvantage and childlessness for British men as well as the importance of men's employment for childbearing decisions in Italy. These findings support the view that pathways into childlessness are gendered and highlight the importance of partnership context in the understanding of fertility intentions. Then, the level of childlessness at interview is comparable across the two countries. However, a higher proportion of respondents in Italy is only provisionally childless, whereas a larger proportion of British respondents intends to remain childless. Framing these differences in fertility intentions within the wider context of family and fertility regimes allows insight into the extent to which observed levels of lifetime childlessness at the population level might result from a specific combination of intended childlessness, postponed decisions leading to involuntary childlessness, or constraints affecting abilities to achieve intentions at the individual level.

Transnational migration, changing care arrangements and left-behind children's responses in South-east Asia.

Recent increases in the volume of labour migration from South-east Asia - and in particular the feminisation of these movements - suggest that millions of children are growing up in transnational families, separated from their migrant parents. Drawing on both quantitative and qualitative data collected in Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, the study seeks to elucidate care arrangements for left-behind children and to understand the ways in which children respond to shifts in intimate family relations brought about by (re)configurations of their care. Our findings emphasise that children, through strategies of resistance, resilience and reworking, are conscious social actors and agents of their own development, albeit within constrained situations resulting from their parents' migration.

Parental migration and the mental health of those who stay behind to care for children in South-East Asia.

The international migration of parents from the global south raises questions about the health impacts of family separation on those who stay behind. This paper uses data collected in 2008 and 2009 for a project on Child Health and Migrant Parents in South-East Asia (CHAMPSEA) to address a largely neglected research area by investigating the mental health of those who stay behind in Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam to care for the children of overseas migrants. A mixed-methods research design is employed to answer two questions. First, whether carers in transnational (migrant) households are more likely to suffer mental health problems than those in non-migrant households; and secondly, whether transnational family practices and characteristics of migration are associated with mental health outcomes for stay-behind carers. The Self-Reporting Questionnaire (SRQ-20) was completed by carers in selected communities (N = 3026) and used to identify likely cases of common mental disorders (CMD). Multivariate logistic regression and thematic analysis of qualitative interviews (N = 149) reveal a nuanced picture. All stay-behind carers in the Indonesian sample are more likely than carers in non-migrant households to suffer CMD. Across the three study countries, however, it is stay-behind mothers with husbands working overseas who are most likely to experience poor mental health. Moreover, infrequent contact with the migrant, not receiving remittances and migrant destinations in the Middle East are all positively associated with carer CMD, whereas greater educational attainment and greater wealth are protective factors. These findings add new evidence on the 'costs' of international labour migration and point to the role of gendered expectations and wider geopolitical structures. Governments and international policy makers need to intervene to encourage transnational family practices that are less detrimental to the mental health of those who stay behind to care for the next generation.

Geographical variations in fertility and transition to second and third birth in Britain.

Geographical variations in fertility have been observed within several countries in Northern Europe, with higher fertility in rural areas, smaller settlements and city suburbs. However, the processes underlying such fertility variations across residential contexts are not well understood. This paper contributes to the on-going debate by looking at local variations in fertility in Britain. It aims to disentangle the relative contribution of a number of factors, including the socio-economic characteristics of individuals, housing conditions, patterns of residential relocation and lastly, contextual factors stricto sensu. In addition, it seeks to identify those aspects of reproductive behaviour which are more likely to be associated with the observed spatial differences, and to distinguish between those that may be influenced by local context and those that respond to social influences at different scales. The focus is on local fertility contexts which, we argue, have the potential to influence the fertility behaviour of individuals through processes of social learning. Individual level data from the British Household Panel Survey and methods of event history analysis are used to explore women's transitions to second and third order births in Britain in the early 21st century. Our findings indicate that individual reproductive life paths respond to a variety of social processes acting at various scales, and that these influences vary by birth order. Most interestingly, local fertility contexts influence transition to first birth but not transition to higher order births, which are mainly associated with individual characteristics of women and their partners. Dominant spacing effects, however, suggest that local contexts have an indirect impact on second and third births through age at the onset of childbearing. The study demonstrates the importance of considering social interaction theories, and their extension to scale-sensitive spatial contexts in which these interactions take place, when analysing geographical variations in fertility. Future research seeking to explain subnational fertility variations must recognize the importance of developing theoretical understandings to inform empirical work.

Migrant Parents and the Psychological Well-Being of Left-Behind Children in Southeast Asia.

Several million children currently live in transnational families, yet little is known about impacts on their health. We investigated the psychological well-being of left-behind children in four Southeast Asian countries. Data were drawn from the CHAMPSEA study. Caregiver reports from the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) were used to examine differences among children under age 12 by the migration status of their household (N = 3,876). We found no general pattern across the four study countries: Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. Multivariate models showed that children of migrant fathers in Indonesia and Thailand are more likely to have poor psychological well-being, compared to children in nonmigrant households. This finding was not replicated for the Philippines or Vietnam. The paper concludes by arguing for more contextualized understandings.