| There is a phenomenon of preference for sons over daughters in many parts of the world. Yet the degree of such preference varies among countries according to demographic, socio-economic, and cultural factors. East-Asian countries are the ones to have the strongest sex preference. Taiwan has been experiencing a drastic fertility decline. Despite the significant fertility reduction, son preference has still been pervasive and extreme. The impact of son preference has even caused the sex ratios at birth to remarkably increase to 110.; The objectives for the present study are to measure the effects of son preference on sex ratios, sex sequences and compositions, and to study the relationship between fertility behavior and various underlying factors including son preference. The data came from Knowledge, Attitude and Practice surveys for Taiwan (1980 to 1992).; Contingency tables and life table analyses are utilized to measure the effects of son preference on sex ratios by family size and parity progression ratios. The Cox proportional hazards model, which has been gaining popularity of late because of its ability to handle censored cases, is employed to analyze the relationship between fertility and various underlying factors.; It is found that the sex ratio at birth of the last-born child is extremely high across different family sizes from 1980 to 1992. In addition, the decision of whether to have additional children is dependent upon sex sequences and sex combinations of existing children. According to multivariate analyses, the risks of having additional children are significantly associated with living arrangement, residence, ideal family size, old age security, and women's education attainment and employment status. Analyses also confirm that son preference has been persistently associated with fertility, controlling for other characteristics.; A new approach, competing risks analysis, is used to study the distorted sex ratio at birth. At parity two, it is shown that the couples with two girls are 2.21 times more likely to have a son, compared to couples with two sons.; Statistical issues related to repeated events (e.g., women's birth history), and competing risks model are also discussed. Examples using our data are presented as well. |
