Partnership transitions among the children of immigrants in Norway: The role of partner choice.

The family life courses of immigrants and their descendants have been widely studied as indicators of societal integration. But largely absent are investigations into the role of cohabitation in the family lives of these subpopulations. Using Norwegian register data on individuals who were either native born or who immigrated before age 18, we analyse the formation of first cohabiting and marital unions. Next, we compare associations between endogamous or exogamous partner choice and transitions from these first unions. Results showed that the children of immigrants were less likely to cohabit endogamously, but overall more likely to cohabit exogamously and to marry than Norwegians without a migration background. Endogamous migrant-background cohabiting unions were least likely to dissolve, whereas cohabiting couples involving one or two majority partners were less marriage prone than endogamous migrant-background couples. Similarly, among those married, endogamous migrant-background couples were less likely to divorce than their exogamous counterparts.

Differences in labour force participation by motherhood status among second-generation Turkish and majority women across Europe.

Second-generation Turkish immigrants make up an increasingly important segment of European labour markets. These young adults are entering the prime working ages and forming families. However, we have only a limited understanding of the relationship between labour force participation and parenthood among second-generation Turkish women. Using unique data from the Integration of the European Second Generation survey (2007/08), we compared the labour force participation of second-generation Turkish women with their majority-group counterparts by motherhood status in four countries. We found evidence that motherhood gaps, with respect to labour force participation, were similar for majority and second-generation Turkish women in Germany and in Sweden; however, there may be larger gaps for second-generation mothers than for majority women in the Netherlands and France. Cross-national findings were consistent with the view that national normative and social policy contexts are relevant for the labour force participation of all women, regardless of migrant background.

Ideal ages for family formation among immigrants in Europe.

This paper investigates ideal ages for marriage and parenthood among immigrants from over 160 countries origins living in 25 European countries. Ideals regarding the timing of family formation are indicative of how individuals perceive the family life course and provide insight into family-life aspirations and the meaning attached to these transitions. Using data from the European Social Survey (Round 3, 2006; N=6330) and a cross-classified multilevel modeling approach, we investigate associations between the influences of the dominant family formation timing patterns in countries of origin and settlement, individual-level characteristics, and ideal ages. We make innovative use of a standard demographic measure, the singulate mean age of marriage, to measure family formation patterns. Results suggest that residential context influences are associated with the timing ideals of all migrants, but origin influences seem to be associated with the ideals of only the most recent migrants.

Home and Where the Heart Is: Marriage Timing and Joint Home Purchase.

This article evaluates the relationship between the timing of marriage and the purchase of a jointly owned home among Swedish cohabiting couples. Data for this analysis come from the Swedish Housing and Life Course Cohort Study (N = 1,596 couples; 2,006 cohabiting spells). The author develops models to proxy for simultaneity and intentions and test hypotheses about positive and negative and long- and short-run relationships between the two life-course events. The author uses a novel modeling approach, allowing for differences in the risk before, concurrently and after the conditioning event. Results indicate a positive relationship between marriage and joint home purchase and suggest the possibility of an ordering of events: For some couples, formalizing their union through marriage may be a prerequisite for a joint home purchase.

Stepfamily childbearing in Sweden: quantum and tempo effects, 1950-99.

Several studies have demonstrated that stepfamily couples have a higher risk of childbearing than couples in a stable union with the same total number of children. Analysing retrospective data from a nationally representative sample of Swedish adults, we find that the risk of a second or third birth is higher when it is the first or second child in a new union. We also find a faster pace of childbearing after stepfamily formation than after a shared birth. The risk of a second birth (in total) is only a little higher in the first two years after stepfamily formation than in the first two years after a shared birth, and thereafter the risk is lower for stepfamilies. The risk of a third birth (in total) is particularly high early in the stepfamily union and remains higher than that of couples with two shared children for at least five years. The stepfamily difference was lower after than before 1980, when the Swedish government introduced parental leave incentives for short birth intervals.