Fertility Transition and Emerging Differences in Parental Investment and Children's Economic Roles

哈佛大学人类学家卡伦·克莱默博士将负责经济转型如何影响生育模式和儿童生活的研究。世界各地自给自足的农民正在经历传统农业制度的变化，变得更不自给自足，更多地依赖于出售劳动力。这些变化对人口产生了重大影响：在许多人口中，生育率急剧下降。然而，人们对这是如何发生的知之甚少，当并非所有家庭都在新经济中繁荣时，家庭之间可能存在多大差异，以及这如何影响儿童的健康和生活质量，这些儿童的劳动往往是旧经济体系的基础。克莱默的研究就是为了回答这些问题。这项研究将在墨西哥坎佩切市的玛雅乡村Xculoc进行。研究设计充分利用了90年代在该村收集的劳动、经济、卫生、人口等方面的详细数据。从那时起，这个村庄开始了从自给自足的农业经济向越来越依赖雇佣劳动力、现金和市场经济的经济过渡的过程。这些现存的数据将作为衡量变化的基准，确定家庭变异性的增加，并探索可能的原因。研究人员将收集80个家庭和390名20岁以下儿童的经济、人口、增长、时间分配和能源消耗数据。本项目的主要研究问题是：1)生存变化对儿童素质（生长表现、饮食、教育、医疗干预和劳动）有什么影响？2)家庭经济特征与生育结果的关系是什么？3)生育率趋势与儿童劳动贡献之间的关系是什么？4)没有资源或机会改善孩子未来的父母，会维持甚至扩大家庭规模吗？而其他父母少生孩子，在孩子的健康和教育上投入更多？这项研究将帮助社会科学家和政策制定者理解为什么高生育率在传统社区持续存在，以及它与经济转型的关系。小规模人类学研究和个人数据为这些被国家和区域趋势掩盖的人口进程提供了宝贵的见解。有兴趣了解计划生育和正在经历经济转型的社区不断变化的保健和经济需求的组织将对这项研究的结果感兴趣。资助这项研究也支持了学生的培训。

Harvard University anthropologist Dr. Karen L. Kramer will undertake research on how economic transitions affect fertility patterns and children's lives. Subsistence farmers worldwide are experiencing changes in their traditional agrarian systems, becoming less self-sufficient and more dependent on selling their labor. These changes have significant demographic effects: in many populations, fertility rates decline dramatically. However, little is known about how this happens, how much variaibility there might be between households when not all of them prosper in the new economy, and how this affects the health and life quality of children whose labor often underwrote the old economic systems. Kramer's research is designed to answer these questions.The research will be carried out in the rural Maya village of Xculoc, Campeche, Mexico. The research design takes advantage of the fact that detailed data on labor, economy, health, and demographics were collected in this village in the 1990s. Since that time, the village has begun the process of transitioning from a subsistence agricultural economy to one that is increasingly dependent on wage labor, cash, and the market economy. These extant data will serve as the baseline against which to measure change, determine increases in household variability, and explore the possible causes. The researcher will collect economic, demographic, growth, time allocation and energy expenditure data for 80 households and 390 children under the age of 20. The project's primary research questions are: 1) What impact does subsistence change have on child quality (growth performance, diet, education, medical intervention and labor)? 2) What is the relationship between household economic characteristics and fertility outcomes?3) What is the relationship between fertility trends and children's labor contributions? 4) Do parents with few resources or opportunities to improve their children's futures, maintain or even increase family size? While other parents have fewer children and invest more in their health and education? This research will help social scientists and policy makers to understand why high fertility persists in traditional communities and its relation to economic transitions. Small-scale anthropological studies and individual data offer valuable insight into these demographic processes, which are otherwise masked by national and regional trends. Findings from this resarch will be of interest to organizations interested in understanding the family planning and changing health and economic needs of communities experiencing economic transitions. Funding this research also supports the training of students.