Linkages of Socio-cultural and Socio-economic Factors to Ideal Number of Children in the Context of Social Change: Generational Differences Explored

Yetty Shobo, Pennsylvania State University

Based on demographers’ suggestions of fertility transition in Africa, the present study uses an expanded version of Caldwell’s intergenerational wealth flow theory to compare structural equation models of 148 Nigerian secondary school adolescents and their mothers. The models link socioeconomic status and individualism and collectivism (I-C) values to social, psychological, and economic values of children (VOC) and then to the ideal number of children for each group. The results revealed significant associations between I-C and VOCs for both adolescents and mothers. However, no association was found between social and economic VOC and the ideal number of children reported by mothers. Only adolescents’ economic VOC and ideal number of children were marginally linked. Psychological VOC was not significantly linked to adolescents’ and mothers’ ideal number of children as hypothesized. The paper explores the implications of these findings for Nigeria’s population growth, fertility transition, and ability to reach replacement fertility level.