Socio-Demographic Changes in Japan and Germany and Cross-Cultural Comparisons of the Value of Children

Abstract

This paper deals with questions of social change from the perspective of socio-demographic changes, especially declining fertility and increasing longevity in industrialized countries. In the first part, the situation in Japan and Germany is compared with respect to similarities and differences in the changing structure of the whole population, relations between female employment and fertility, and the changing structure of the family. In the second part, the concept of "value of children" is introduced in order to study the possible effects of macro- and micro-level variables on socio-demographic changes. Here, the question is dealt with in how far characteristics of societies are related to values associated with having children. Some results on this issue from our large multi-country study on the "Value of Children and lntergenerational Relations" are presented. The main results are that the emotional value of children is high in most countries and does not differentiate between low and high fertility; the economic value of children is relatively higher in those countries with lower economic development, lower postmaterialist values, and lower religious orientation. In the final part, these results are discussed with respect to the questions of changes in birth rate, parenting, and parent-child-relationships over the life-span. These issues can be integrated as part of a model of value of children and intergenerational relations in changing societies.