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

哈佛大学人类学家凯伦·L.克雷默将研究经济转型如何影响生育模式和儿童生活。全世界的自给农民正在经历传统农业制度的变化，自给自足的程度越来越低，越来越依赖出卖劳动力。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，人们对这种情况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的差异，以及这如何影响儿童的健康和生活质量，他们的劳动往往是旧经济体系的基础。克雷默的研究旨在回答这些问题。研究将在墨西哥坎佩切州Xculoc的玛雅乡村进行。研究设计利用了这样一个事实，即在20世纪90年代在这个村庄收集了有关劳动力，经济，健康和人口统计的详细数据。从那时起，该村开始从自给自足的农业经济过渡到越来越依赖雇佣劳动、现金和市场经济的经济。这些现有数据将作为衡量变化的基线，确定家庭差异的增加情况，并探讨可能的原因。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、时间分配和能源支出数据。该项目的主要研究问题是：1）生活水平的变化对儿童质量（生长表现、饮食、教育、医疗干预和劳动力）有什么影响？ 2)家庭经济特征与生育结果之间有何关系？3)生育趋势与儿童劳动力贡献之间的关系是什么？4)没有多少资源或机会来改善子女未来的父母，是否会维持甚至增加家庭规模？ 而其他父母的孩子更少，对他们的健康和教育投资更多？这项研究将帮助社会科学家和政策制定者了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。小规模的人类学研究和个人数据为这些人口统计过程提供了宝贵的见解，否则这些人口统计过程会被国家和区域趋势所掩盖。这项研究的结果将对有兴趣了解计划生育和经历经济转型的社区不断变化的健康和经济需求的组织感兴趣。资助这项研究也支持学生的培训。

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.