Anna Rotkirch
Biographic Data
| ID | 93878 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Anna Rotkirch |
| GIVEN NAMES | Anna |
| FAMILY NAME | Rotkirch |
| SIGNATURE | ROTKIRCH A |
| AFFILIATIONS | Väestöliitto |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9429-1499 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 45 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 244 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 43 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 9 |
Regional social capital and fertility rate
While many studies find that received social capital matters for childbearing on the individual level, few studies have investigated how regional social factors relate to fertility rates. In the current study, we used data from 299 municipalities in Finland to examine how different measures of social capital are associated with total fertility rates at the regional level. Data for social indicators were derived from a large national survey (n = 1…
The role of living kin in later-life survival
Research on kinship and survival is well established in modern societies, but less is known about historical populations. This study examines the presence of children, siblings, and grandchildren in later life and their association with survival in pre-industrial Finland. We use records of 6,900 Finns born in 1740-1859 to estimate discrete-time hazard models for mortality at ages 50-90. At age 50, most individuals had at least one living child or…
“Think about it all the time”. Reproductive cues in a late and low fertility setting
The concept of reproductive cues is used to reflect on our childbearing landscape. Originating in life history theory within evolutionary biology, the term captures environmental signals for when it is a good time to have and raise offspring – but also, crucially, when it appears to be a very bad idea. The article discusses how bodily, social, institutional and technological cues for childbearing shape the timing of parenthood today. I argue that…
Widowhood and grandchild care
The death of a spouse is a major life event, commonly experienced in later adulthood. While existing research suggests that widowhood may reduce the provision of grandchild care, most studies have relied on cross-sectional comparisons between widowed and non-widowed individuals. In this study, we use longitudinal data from the Survey of Health, Aging, and Retirement in Europe (SHARE; n = 27,467) to examine how changes in partnership status are as…
Fertility trends across migrant generations reexamined
Migrant descendants in several European countries show increasingly lower fertility rates, sometimes even lower than native-born peers—a pattern defying conventional expectations that migrant descendants either maintain origin-country patterns or converge toward host-country norms. Using Finnish register data (1985–1994 birth cohorts), we analyze first-birth timing across six ancestry groups spanning three migrant generations: 1.5, second, and 2.…
Both Partnership History and Current Relationship Quality are Associated With Life Satisfaction in Old Age
Romantic relationships significantly impact physical and mental wellbeing. While both partnership history and current relationship quality influence wellbeing in later life, they are seldom investigated together. This study examines the long-term effects of partnership history on wellbeing, exploring whether current relationship quality can mitigate the impact of past experiences. Using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Eu…
Stable Marital Histories Predict Happiness and Health Across Educational Groups
Couple relations are a key determinant of mental and physical well-being in old age. However, we do not know how the advantages and disadvantages associated with partnership histories vary between socioeconomic groups. We create relationship history typologies for the cohorts 1945-1957 using the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe and examine, for the first time, how relationship histories relate to multiple indicators of well-bein…
Changes in ageing women’s sexual subjectivity as seen from a life course perspective
This article explores the sexual subjectivity of women of post-reproductive age who seek partners on dating apps. The existing literature highlights the sexual subjectivity and agency of older women as contested and not sufficiently investigated. Even less research has been conducted on changes in the sexual subjectivity of women born in the USSR in the 1960s, with the liberalisation of sexual behaviour. The study is based on 45 interviews with w…
Adult Children's Timing of Entry into Parenthood
Highly educated individuals have their first child at later ages compared to less-educated individuals, and parental investment is associated with the childbearing of adult children. However, no studies have explored the association between maternal and paternal investment and the timing of parenthood for adult daughters and sons, and whether this association varies by education level. Based on the parenthood penalty and life-history theory, it i…
Residential mobility and social capital
Multiple factors can influence the rates of residential mobility flows between different regions of a country. Studies have often focused on demographic and economic factors, but social conditions may be relevant as well. We examined whether different indicators of social capital (i.e., social support, loneliness, social trust, community participation, cultural activities, and meeting other people) were associated with population migration rates …
Psychological and social wellbeing associated with regional population change in Finland
Regional depopulation is an increasingly common demographic issue in many countries, as population growth becomes concentrated in small number of urban centres. Depopulation has adverse effects on the region's socioeconomic development, and often leads to worse living circumstances, such as poor availability of services. Population growth, by contrast, has many socioeconomic benefits but may also introduce unwanted consequences, such as urban ali…
Partnership Histories Shape the Grandparenting Happiness Bonus
Evolutionary theory predicts that returns on investments in family relations will vary by sex and life stage and that there can be a trade-off between mating and (grand)parenting. Family sociology has shown that whereas couple relations are central to happiness in older age, the effects of grandparenting are more mixed and context dependent. Here, we merge these two perspectives and study how partnership histories over the life course relate to h…
Social Resources are Associated With Higher Fertility Intentions in Contemporary Finland
Lower childbearing intentions can stem from a lack of social resources. However, not only actual but also perceived social support might signal that parents and parents-to-be will not be alone after having a child. Using register and GGS-Finland data from 2021-22, we investigate how emotional and instrumental support received from parents and other social network members, as well as a person's subjective feeling that their social network is suffi…
Birth cohort changes in fertility ideals
Fertility has declined in developed countries but whether there is a similar pattern in the number of children individuals wish to have (henceforth an ideal number of children) remains unclear. Using repeated cross-sectional survey data from the Finnish Family Barometers, we examine birth cohort changes in the ideal number of children among men and women from five birth cohorts (1970-1974, 1975-1979, 1980-1984, 1985-1989, and 1990-1994). We also …
Do Working and Parenting Trajectories Influence Retirement Timing? Evidence From Spain, Using a Sequence Analysis Approach and Focusing on Women
This paper investigates the association between accumulated experiences in the working and parenting spheres and retirement timing among Spanish women, utilizing data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). The study examines whether labor market attachment or cumulative disadvantage characterizes women’s retirement and how these factors relate with the number of children. Firstly, multichannel sequence analysis and cl…
Reasons to Postpone Childbearing during Fertility Decline in Finland
We examined self-reported reasons to postpone childbearing during fertility decline in Finland in 2010s and their associations with sociodemographic factors, as well as social media use and work-related attitudes. Using representative survey data from Finnish Family Barometers, the sample comprised participants aged 20–44 who did not plan having (more) children soon. Based on exploratory factor analysis, reasons to postpone childbearing were grou…
Effects of information and communication technology on the quality of family relationships
Information and communication technology (ICT) facilitates communication within families but may also displace face-to-face communication and intimacy. The aims of this systematic review were to investigate what positive and negative relationship outcomes are associated with ICT use in families, and whether and how the outcomes differ depending on relationship type (romantic relationship, parent–child relationship, or sibling). Included in the re…
Parental Relationships and Family Functioning of Finnish Children Living with LGBTQ+ Parents
Our knowledge of family relations and well-being in LGBTQ+ families is increasing, yet few studies so far have gathered quantitative data from both children and parents. The Finnish Rainbow Family study conducted surveys of 10–12-year-old children (N = 41), 13–18-year-old adolescents (N = 47), and of parents of 7–18-year-old children (N = 80 parents/103 responses) living in a LGBTQ+ family. Unlike many earlier surveys, we also asked about experie…
Kin detection cues and sibling relationship quality in adulthood
Cues facilitating kin detection among children have been suggested to have a profound impact on adult sibling relationships. Using a large and population-based data of younger and middle-aged Finns, we test how childhood co-residence duration and maternal perinatal association (MPA) correlate with contact frequency, emotional closeness and provision of help between adult siblings. Employing sibling fixed-effect regression models we show that dura…
Brothers and Sisters
Brothers and Sisters
Integration involves a trade-off between fertility and status for World War II evacuees
Understanding how refugees integrate into host societies has broad implications for researchers interested in intergroup conflict and for governments concerned with promoting social cohesion. Using detailed records tracking the movements and life histories of Finnish evacuees during World War II, we find that evacuees who intermarry are more likely to be educated, work in professional occupations, marry someone higher in social status and remain …
Sibling similarity and relationship quality in Finland
Siblings form the strongest horizontal family tie, which often involves life-long emotional closeness and various forms of support. Similarity is often assumed to strengthen sibling relations, but existing evidence is scarce and mixed. Using data from the Generational Transmissions in Finland surveys collected in 2012, we employ both total and sibling fixed-effect regressions and examine whether sibling similarity is associated with relationship …
Twenty-first century grandparents
This special issue on Grandparents highlights the increasing role that they are taking in raising the next generation, not only in the United Kingdom, but across the world. Why are grandparents playing a major role in rearing the next generation? Firstly, older people are living longer and are healthier so they are more available. Also rising divorce rates, increases in single parenthood, more working mothers and the globalisation of work has fue…
Migration patterns of parents, children and siblings
Family members are known to serve as geographical attractors in migration, yet evidence for sex‐biased family migration in developed societies is mixed. We investigate gender differences in migration of family members in Finland. Using the FinnFamily register data set ( N = 60,000 index individuals and their close kin), we explore family coresidence and migration within the 19 administrative regions of Finland in 1970–2012. We study the propensit…
The Man Question
4 The frailty of the heterosexual relation 78 4.1 The obligation of marrying Reasons for marrying: Getting away -Pregnancy 4.2 Variations on the norm Nina's story -Reasons for not marrying -Divorces: The rocks of everyday life -Emotional abandonment -Illegal abortions -Second chances 4.3 Love of children `Becoming my own mother' -Longing for a second child -Which basic instinct?-Summary V 8 Working poor: social marginality and sexual promiscuity …
Gender equality and fertility intentions revisited
Stimulated by the recent debate on gender roles and menâ s fertility behaviour (Puur et al. 2008; Westoff and Higgins 2009; Goldscheider, Oláh and Puur 2010), we present evidence from Finland as a country well into the second phase of the so-called gend
Women's housework decreases fertility
Changes in the gendered divisions of domestic work are often assumed to influence couples' childbearing behaviour, but existing evidence is mixed and mostly limited to cross-sectional data. We study how the amount and division of housework and childcare predict subsequent childbearing among Finnish couples using Finnish Time Use Survey 1999-2000 (FTUS1999) time diary data linked with register data on subsequent births. Results show that women's h…
Twenty-first century grandparents
This special issue on Grandparents highlights the increasing role that they are taking in raising the next generation, not only in the United Kingdom, but across the world. Why are grandparents playing a major role in rearing the next generation? Firstly, older people are living longer and are healthier so they are more available. Also rising divorce rates, increases in single parenthood, more working mothers and the globalisation of work has fue…
The impact of grandparental investment on mothers’ fertility intentions in four European countries
Evolutionary theory predicts that grandparental investment should support the childbearing of adult children, but evidence from contemporary developed countries is mixed or relatively weak. One possible reason for this lack of clarity is that grandparental
Grandparental Effects on Fertility Vary by Lineage in the United Kingdom
Who Helps the Degraded Housewife
This article analyses the new demographic programme that was announced by the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, in 2006. The main goal of this programme is to encourage fertility, especially the birth of a second child. New benefits should elevate the status of wome taking maternity leave, who might otherwise suffer from discrimination in the family. The housewife is considered to be dependent and `degraded'. We argue that this demographic polit…
Impact of Genetic Relatedness and Emotional Closeness on Intergenerational Relations
Both emotional closeness and genetic relatedness are known to influence helping behavior between family generations, yet few studies have explored them together. The authors investigated the associations between (a) parenthood and perceived emotional closeness toward own parents and parents-in-law and (b) emotional closeness and receiving child care from grandparents across and within lineage lines. The data include information on the 8 dyads of …
Reasons to Postpone Childbearing during Fertility Decline in Finland
We examined self-reported reasons to postpone childbearing during fertility decline in Finland in 2010s and their associations with sociodemographic factors, as well as social media use and work-related attitudes. Using representative survey data from Finnish Family Barometers, the sample comprised participants aged 20–44 who did not plan having (more) children soon. Based on exploratory factor analysis, reasons to postpone childbearing were grou…
Birth cohort changes in fertility ideals
Fertility has declined in developed countries but whether there is a similar pattern in the number of children individuals wish to have (henceforth an ideal number of children) remains unclear. Using repeated cross-sectional survey data from the Finnish Family Barometers, we examine birth cohort changes in the ideal number of children among men and women from five birth cohorts (1970-1974, 1975-1979, 1980-1984, 1985-1989, and 1990-1994). We also …
Using maternity capital
During the last decade Russian politics have aimed at stimulating the birth rate, most famously by the maternity capital program. This article provides results from the first extensive study of citizen use and attitudes to this benefit and concludes that Russian women and families harbor a deep distrust of the program and Russian social policy, as it sends contradictory messages combining paternalistic and liberal trends. Many eligible mothers ha…
All that she wants is a(nother) baby’? Longing for children as a fertility incentive of growing importance
The article discusses the existence and outlook of an evolved desire to have children. Twin studies have found a genetic basis for conscious attempts to get pregnant. This heritable disposition increasingly affects societies of wide female reproductive choice (Kohler et al 1999). Based on 106 stories written by Finnish women in 2006, I analyse the symptoms, triggers and behaviour related to longing for babies. I suggest that a strong longing for …
Migration patterns of parents, children and siblings
Family members are known to serve as geographical attractors in migration, yet evidence for sex‐biased family migration in developed societies is mixed. We investigate gender differences in migration of family members in Finland. Using the FinnFamily register data set ( N = 60,000 index individuals and their close kin), we explore family coresidence and migration within the 19 administrative regions of Finland in 1970–2012. We study the propensit…
Diluted Competition? Conflicts between Full- and Half-Siblings in Two Adult Generations
Sibling relations are typically close but ambivalent, including both altruism and competition. Full siblings are often assumed to exhibit more altruism and less competition than half-siblings. However, previous empirical findings indicate that this assumption may not hold for sibling conflicts in contemporary humans. We study self-reported occurrence of sibling conflicts among adults in two generations with nationally representative data from the…
Personality is differentially associated with planned and non-planned pregnancies
Social Resources are Associated With Higher Fertility Intentions in Contemporary Finland
Lower childbearing intentions can stem from a lack of social resources. However, not only actual but also perceived social support might signal that parents and parents-to-be will not be alone after having a child. Using register and GGS-Finland data from 2021-22, we investigate how emotional and instrumental support received from parents and other social network members, as well as a person's subjective feeling that their social network is suffi…
Sibling similarity and relationship quality in Finland
Siblings form the strongest horizontal family tie, which often involves life-long emotional closeness and various forms of support. Similarity is often assumed to strengthen sibling relations, but existing evidence is scarce and mixed. Using data from the Generational Transmissions in Finland surveys collected in 2012, we employ both total and sibling fixed-effect regressions and examine whether sibling similarity is associated with relationship …
Integration involves a trade-off between fertility and status for World War II evacuees
Understanding how refugees integrate into host societies has broad implications for researchers interested in intergroup conflict and for governments concerned with promoting social cohesion. Using detailed records tracking the movements and life histories of Finnish evacuees during World War II, we find that evacuees who intermarry are more likely to be educated, work in professional occupations, marry someone higher in social status and remain …
Psychological and social wellbeing associated with regional population change in Finland
Regional depopulation is an increasingly common demographic issue in many countries, as population growth becomes concentrated in small number of urban centres. Depopulation has adverse effects on the region's socioeconomic development, and often leads to worse living circumstances, such as poor availability of services. Population growth, by contrast, has many socioeconomic benefits but may also introduce unwanted consequences, such as urban ali…
Do Working and Parenting Trajectories Influence Retirement Timing? Evidence From Spain, Using a Sequence Analysis Approach and Focusing on Women
This paper investigates the association between accumulated experiences in the working and parenting spheres and retirement timing among Spanish women, utilizing data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). The study examines whether labor market attachment or cumulative disadvantage characterizes women’s retirement and how these factors relate with the number of children. Firstly, multichannel sequence analysis and cl…
Parental Relationships and Family Functioning of Finnish Children Living with LGBTQ+ Parents
Our knowledge of family relations and well-being in LGBTQ+ families is increasing, yet few studies so far have gathered quantitative data from both children and parents. The Finnish Rainbow Family study conducted surveys of 10–12-year-old children (N = 41), 13–18-year-old adolescents (N = 47), and of parents of 7–18-year-old children (N = 80 parents/103 responses) living in a LGBTQ+ family. Unlike many earlier surveys, we also asked about experie…
The Man Question
4 The frailty of the heterosexual relation 78 4.1 The obligation of marrying Reasons for marrying: Getting away -Pregnancy 4.2 Variations on the norm Nina's story -Reasons for not marrying -Divorces: The rocks of everyday life -Emotional abandonment -Illegal abortions -Second chances 4.3 Love of children `Becoming my own mother' -Longing for a second child -Which basic instinct?-Summary V 8 Working poor: social marginality and sexual promiscuity …
Vem är rädd för städerskan
All that she wants is a(nother) baby’? Longing for children as a fertility incentive of growing importance
The article discusses the existence and outlook of an evolved desire to have children. Twin studies have found a genetic basis for conscious attempts to get pregnant. This heritable disposition increasingly affects societies of wide female reproductive choice (Kohler et al 1999). Based on 106 stories written by Finnish women in 2006, I analyse the symptoms, triggers and behaviour related to longing for babies. I suggest that a strong longing for …
Who Helps the Degraded Housewife
This article analyses the new demographic programme that was announced by the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, in 2006. The main goal of this programme is to encourage fertility, especially the birth of a second child. New benefits should elevate the status of wome taking maternity leave, who might otherwise suffer from discrimination in the family. The housewife is considered to be dependent and `degraded'. We argue that this demographic polit…
Do grandparents favor granddaughters? Biased grandparental investment in UK
Gender equality and fertility intentions revisited
Stimulated by the recent debate on gender roles and menâ s fertility behaviour (Puur et al. 2008; Westoff and Higgins 2009; Goldscheider, Oláh and Puur 2010), we present evidence from Finland as a country well into the second phase of the so-called gend
Personality is differentially associated with planned and non-planned pregnancies
Personality and long-term reproductive success measured by the number of grandchildren
Using maternity capital
During the last decade Russian politics have aimed at stimulating the birth rate, most famously by the maternity capital program. This article provides results from the first extensive study of citizen use and attitudes to this benefit and concludes that Russian women and families harbor a deep distrust of the program and Russian social policy, as it sends contradictory messages combining paternalistic and liberal trends. Many eligible mothers ha…
The impact of grandparental investment on mothers’ fertility intentions in four European countries
Evolutionary theory predicts that grandparental investment should support the childbearing of adult children, but evidence from contemporary developed countries is mixed or relatively weak. One possible reason for this lack of clarity is that grandparental
Grandparental Effects on Fertility Vary by Lineage in the United Kingdom
Whither the Child? Causes and Consequences of Low Fertility
© 2014 ANNA ROTKIRCHPopulation Research Institute, Väestöliitto, Helsinki, [email protected]
Women's housework decreases fertility
Changes in the gendered divisions of domestic work are often assumed to influence couples' childbearing behaviour, but existing evidence is mixed and mostly limited to cross-sectional data. We study how the amount and division of housework and childcare predict subsequent childbearing among Finnish couples using Finnish Time Use Survey 1999-2000 (FTUS1999) time diary data linked with register data on subsequent births. Results show that women's h…
Impact of Genetic Relatedness and Emotional Closeness on Intergenerational Relations
Both emotional closeness and genetic relatedness are known to influence helping behavior between family generations, yet few studies have explored them together. The authors investigated the associations between (a) parenthood and perceived emotional closeness toward own parents and parents-in-law and (b) emotional closeness and receiving child care from grandparents across and within lineage lines. The data include information on the 8 dyads of …
Emotional Closeness Predicted by Relatedness
Grandfathers
Grandparents in contemporary industrialized societies invest substantial amounts of time, money and care in the grandchildren. For example, in the USA in 2007, 2.5 million grandparents were responsible for meeting most of the basic needs of one or more of the grandchildren who lived in their household (US Census Bureau 2009). Across eleven European countries, 44% of grandparents reported to have provided childcare for their grandchildren in the l…
Diluted Competition? Conflicts between Full- and Half-Siblings in Two Adult Generations
Sibling relations are typically close but ambivalent, including both altruism and competition. Full siblings are often assumed to exhibit more altruism and less competition than half-siblings. However, previous empirical findings indicate that this assumption may not hold for sibling conflicts in contemporary humans. We study self-reported occurrence of sibling conflicts among adults in two generations with nationally representative data from the…
Sibling Conflicts in Full- And Half-Sibling Households in the Uk
Sibling relations are by nature ambivalent with high levels of both altruistic helping and competition. Higher relatedness is often assumed to reduce the occurrence of conflicts between siblings, but evidence of this has been scarce and mixed. Siblings typically compete over resources and parental attention, and parental constellations vary with sibship types. Since full-siblings compete over the same two biological parents, while half-siblings h…
Manipulative Use of Kin Terminology
The Company You Keep
Studies on personality and friendship have focused on similarities between friends, while differences in friendship patterns have received less attention. We used data from the British Household Panel Survey data ( N = 12,098) to investigate how people’s personalities are related to various characteristics of their three closest friends. All personality traits of the five-factor model were associated with several friendship characteristics with e…
Twenty-first century grandparents
This special issue on Grandparents highlights the increasing role that they are taking in raising the next generation, not only in the United Kingdom, but across the world. Why are grandparents playing a major role in rearing the next generation? Firstly, older people are living longer and are healthier so they are more available. Also rising divorce rates, increases in single parenthood, more working mothers and the globalisation of work has fue…
Migration patterns of parents, children and siblings
Family members are known to serve as geographical attractors in migration, yet evidence for sex‐biased family migration in developed societies is mixed. We investigate gender differences in migration of family members in Finland. Using the FinnFamily register data set ( N = 60,000 index individuals and their close kin), we explore family coresidence and migration within the 19 administrative regions of Finland in 1970–2012. We study the propensit…
Integration involves a trade-off between fertility and status for World War II evacuees
Understanding how refugees integrate into host societies has broad implications for researchers interested in intergroup conflict and for governments concerned with promoting social cohesion. Using detailed records tracking the movements and life histories of Finnish evacuees during World War II, we find that evacuees who intermarry are more likely to be educated, work in professional occupations, marry someone higher in social status and remain …
Sibling similarity and relationship quality in Finland
Siblings form the strongest horizontal family tie, which often involves life-long emotional closeness and various forms of support. Similarity is often assumed to strengthen sibling relations, but existing evidence is scarce and mixed. Using data from the Generational Transmissions in Finland surveys collected in 2012, we employ both total and sibling fixed-effect regressions and examine whether sibling similarity is associated with relationship …
Brothers and Sisters
Family Dynamics and Relationships (25 works) · Psychology (25 works) · Sociology (22 works) · Demography (19 works) · Intergenerational Family Dynamics and Caregiving (18 works) · Developmental psychology (16 works) · Population (16 works) · Fertility (14 works) · Political science (14 works) · Social Psychology (14 works)