The Impact of Multiple Births on Fertility: Stopping and Spacing in the United States During the Demographic Transition

Multiple births strain moth ers' and fam i lies' resources in ways that should high light pref er ences for fam ily size, birth spac ing, and par ity-depen dent stop ping behav ior. Couples with sur viv ing twins reach their tar get fam ily size sooner than other cou ples and should be more likely to prac tice fam ily lim i ta tion. Twins are also a greater bur den on the mother's time and health, which could lead to post pon ing the next birth, even among cou ples who want addi tional chil dren. We exam ine these hypoth e ses by ana lyz ing fam i lies with twins in the 1900 and 1910 U.S. Censuses. Using reconstructed birth his to ries for more than 7 mil lion women in the IPUMS full-count 1900 and 1910 datasets and event-his tory meth ods (Kaplan-Meier curves, cure mod els), we find clear evi dence of fam ily lim i ta tion fol low ing a mul ti ple birth. Couples who had twins or triplets were more likely to stop child bear ing, and those who con tin ued hav ing chil dren delayed their next birth. Responses to mul ti ple births were larger in groups pre vi ously iden ti fied as lead ers in the tran si tion to smaller fam i lies, and roughly one third of couples stopped after one or two chil dren. We find no evi dence that some groups relied primar ily on birth spac ing to reduce fam ily size while oth ers relied pri mar ily on stop ping.