1. CHAPTER 10
Planning for Children

2. Discussion Questions
Do you want children? Why? How many? Would it be ok if you never had any kids?
Discuss lifestyle changes and financial costs associated with having and rearing a child.
Discuss the respective positions of prolife and prochoice.

3. Chapter 10: Planning for Children Chapter Outline
Do You Want to Have Children?
How Many Children Do You Want?
Teenage Motherhood
Infertility
Adoption
Sterilization
Abortion

4. Chapter 10: Planning for Children Introduction
Food for thought…
Among youth between the ages of 18 and 29:
74% noted that they wanted to have children.
52% said that “being a good parent” was important.
30% said that “having a successful marriage” was important.

5. True or False About 1/3 of births in the US are unintended
Most women obtaining abortions are able to rely on their male partners for social support
Women who have had a tubal ligation are less likely to experience extremely high levels of sexual satisfaction, relationship satisfaction, and sexual pleasure.
With the availability of emergency contraception pills, unintended pregnancy rates have decreased
American couples who adopt tend to prefer out of country adoption over domestic adoption

6. Social Influences Motivating Individuals to Have Children
Family
Friends
Religion
Race
Government
Economy
Cultural Observations

7. Pronatalism Attitudes that encourage childbearing
Family, friends, religion, and government help develop positive attitudes toward parenthood.
Cultural observances reinforce these attitudes.

8. Older Parents
There are advantages and disadvantages of having a child as an elderly parent.
The primary advantage is the amount of attention parents can devote to their offspring.
The primary disadvantage is that parents are likely to die before, or early in, the child’s adult life.
There are also medical concerns for both mother and child during pregnancy in later life.

9. Individual Motivations for Having Children
Conscious motivations include:
The desire to love and to be loved by one’s own child
Companionship with one’s own offspring
The desire to be personally fulfilled as an adult by having a child

10. Lifestyle Changes
Daily living routines become focused around the children.
Living arrangements change to provide space for another person in the household.
Some parents change their work schedule to allow them to be home more.
A major lifestyle change is the loss of freedom of activity and flexibility in one’s personal schedule.

11. Financial Costs of Parenthood
An uncomplicated birth, with a two-day hospital stay, may total $10,000.
A cesarean section birth may cost $14,000.
Annual cost of a child less than two years old for middle income parents ($56,670 to $98,120), including housing, food, transportation, clothing, health care, and childcare, is $11,700.
For a 15- to 17-year-old, the cost is $13,530.

12. How Many Children?
“My mom used to say it doesn’t matter how many kids you have because one kid’ll take up 100% of your time so more kids can’t possibly take up more than 100% of your time.”
Karen Brown

13. Childfree Marriage Childfree marriages may be viewed by society with:
Suspicion
Avoidance
Discomfort
Rejection
Pity

14. Childfree Marriage
Top five reasons given in Laura Scott’s (2009) Childless by Choice Project for not having children include:
Life/relationship satisfaction
Being free and independent
Avoid responsibility of rearing a child
Absence of maternal/paternal instinct
Desire to accomplish and experience things in life

15. One Child Only 3% of adults view one child as the ideal family size
Reasons for only one child
Experience parenthood without children markedly interfering with one’s lifestyle and career
Difficulty in pregnancy or birthing the child
Inability to get pregnant a second time

16. Two Children
Most preferred family size in the United States for non-Hispanic white women is the two-child family
Reasons for only two children
Feeling that a family is “non-complete” with less than two children
Having a companion for the first child
Having a child of each sex
Repeating the positive experience of parenthood enjoyed with the first child
Not wanting to “put all their eggs in one basket”

17. Three Children
More likely if the couple already has two girls rather than two boys
Each additional child reduces the amount of parental involvement and financial resources for that child
Creates a “middle child”
Neglected because of the attention given to the oldest and the “baby”

18. Multiple Children
Hispanics are more likely to want larger families than are white or African American parents
Four children may be the new norm for affluent families
Competitive birthing

19. Choosing One’s Children
What are the advantages and disadvantages to a couple having genetic testing before becoming pregnant?
What are possible reasons for a couple to choose sex selection technology?

20. Teenage Motherhood Problems: Stigmatized and marginalized
Poverty among single teen mothers and their children
Poor health habits
Lower academic achievement
Personal health and psychosocial adjustment

21. Teenage Motherhood in the Media
Examples of teen motherhood
16 and Pregnant
Teen Mom
Secret Life of an American Teenager
Juno
Does the media encourage or discourage teen pregnancy?

22. Types of Infertility Primary Secondary Pregnancy Wastage
A woman has never conceived though she has had regular sexual relations for twelve months.
Secondary
A woman has previously conceived but is currently unable to do so even though she has had regular sexual relations for twelve months.
Pregnancy Wastage
A woman has been able to conceive but has been unable to produce a live birth.

23. Causes of Infertility
40% of infertility problems are attributed to the woman.
40% of infertility problems are attributed to the man.
20% of infertility problems are attributed to both the man and woman.

24. Causes of Male Infertility
Low sperm production
Poor semen motility
Effects of sexually transmitted infections
Interference with passage of sperm through the genital ducts due to an enlarged prostate

25. Causes of Female Infertility
Blocked fallopian tubes
Endocrine imbalance that prevents ovulation
Dysfunctional ovaries
Chemically hostile cervical mucus that may kill sperm
Effects of sexually transmitted infections

26. Assisted Reproductive Technology
Hormone Therapy
Artificial Insemination
Artificial Insemination of a Surrogate Mother
In Vitro Fertilization
Ovum Transfer

27. Routes to Adoption Public Private Agency Independent Adoption Kinship
Stepparent

28. Motives for Adoption Inability to have a biological child
Desire to give an otherwise unwanted child a permanent loving home
Desire to avoid contributing to overpopulation by having more biological children
Less than 5% of couples adopt, and 15% of these adoptions will be children from other countries

29. Adoption
Demographic characteristics of people seeking to adopt a child: white, educated, and high-income.
Characteristics of children available for adoption: healthy, white infants.
Costs of adoption
U.S. foster care system: little or no cost
Agency and private adoptions: $5,000 - $40,000
International adoptions: $7,000 - $30,000

30. Adoption Transracial Adoption Open versus Closed Adoptions
Intercountry Adoptions
Foster Parenting

31. Children Who Are Adopted
Outperformed non-adopted children
Questions adopted children must deal with
Who are your real parents?
Why did your mother give you up?
Are those your real parents?
W.I.S.E. UP
Walk away
Ignore or change the subject
Share what you are comfortable sharing
Educate about adoption in general

32. Sterilization Permanent surgical procedure that prevents reproduction
Reasons for sterilization
Should not have more children for health reasons
When certain about the desire to have no more children or to remain childfree
Risk of pill use at older ages and the lower reliability of alternative birth control methods

33. Female Sterilization
More than half of all sterilizations are performed on women.
Types of female sterilization
Oophorectomy
Hysterectomy
Salpingectomy
Laparoscopy
Essure

34. Female Sterilization: Tubal Sterilization

35. Male Sterilization
Male sterilization is easier and safer than female sterilization
Vasectomy
Most frequent form of male sterilization
Safe and cost-effective intervention for permanent male contraception
Procedure takes about fifteen minutes
May be reversed with a 30 to 60% success rate

36. Abortion
An induced abortion is the deliberate termination of a pregnancy through chemical or surgical means.
A spontaneous abortion (miscarriage) is the unintended termination of a pregnancy.

37. Abortion Rates 1.21 million abortions performed in the U.S. in 2008
Abortion rate (number of abortions per thousand women aged 15 to 44) increased 1% between 2005 and 2008
19.4 to 19.6 abortions per 1,000 women

38. Who Gets Abortions and Why
1,209 pregnant women who reported having an abortion reported the following reasons:
74% - The child would interfere with education, work, or ability to care for dependents.
73% - She could not afford a baby now.
48% - She did not want to be a single mother or was having relationship problems.

39. Pro-Life Advocates Advocate restrictive abortion or a ban on abortion.
General beliefs:
The unborn fetus has a right to live.
Abortion is a violent and immoral solution to unintended pregnancy.
The life of an unborn fetus is sacred and should be protected, even at the cost of individual difficulties for the pregnant woman.

40. Pro-Life Advocates Characteristics of a pro-life advocate
Over the age of 44
Male
Mothers of three or more children
Married to white-collar workers
Affiliated with a religion
Catholic

41. Pro-Choice Advocates
Support the legal availability of abortion for all women.
General beliefs:
Freedom of choice is a central value.
Those who must bear the burden of their choices ought to have the right to make these choices.
Procreation choices must be free of governmental control.

42. Pro-Choice Advocates Characteristics of a pro-choice advocate Female
Mothers of one or two children
Some college education
Employed
Annual income of more than $50,000

43. Physical Effects of Abortion
Legal abortions, performed under safe medical conditions, are safer than continuing the pregnancy
Post-abortion complications include:
Possibility of incomplete abortion
Uterine infection
Excessive bleeding
Perforation or laceration of the uterus, bowel, or adjacent organs
Adverse reaction to a medication or anesthetic

44. Psychological Effects of Abortion
For most women, a legal first-trimester abortion does not create psychological hazards, and symptoms of distress are within normal bounds.

45. Partner Knowledge of and Support for Abortion
Overwhelming majority of women report that the men with whom they got pregnant knew and supported the woman’s decision to have an abortion
Cohabitating men were particularly supportive
In a 2004 study, most men were happy with the decision of their partners to have an abortion

46. Quick Quiz
True of False? Most men of partners who had an abortion tended to regret the abortion.
Ans: False

47. Quick Quiz
True or False? Children of donor sperm want to find more about their father due to economic motives.
Ans: False

48. Quick Quiz Pronatalism refers to which of the following?
Sanctifying children to their religion
Encouraging childbearing
Encouraging stability regarding overpopulation
Sexual values
Ans: B

49. Quick Quiz
Demographic characteristics of people who typically adopt are:
white, educated, and high-income
young, flexible, and idealistic
families who want a child of a different sex than their own child
older, gay, and single
Ans: A

50. Quick Quiz Which of the following is not a form of birth control?
Vasectomy
Salpingectomy
Douching
Laparoscopy
Ans: C