Birth spacing and the health of mothers and fathers

Birth spacing and the health of mothers and fathers: an analysis of physical and mental health using individual- and sibling-fixed effects

Part of the International Social and Public Policy Seminar Series
Hosted by the Department of Social Policy on 21 March 2024

Presenter: Dr Kieron Barclay (Stockholm University)
Chair: Professor Berkay Ozcan (Department of Social Policy LSE)

Abstract: Decisions around reproductive timing may have important consequences for the health of parents. There is a large literature examining the relationship between birth spacing and subsequent health outcomes for parents, and particularly for mothers. Previous studies find that both shorter and longer birth intervals are associated with worse health outcomes than birth intervals of approximately 2-3 years. However, almost all research on this topic lacks an identification strategy. In this study we use Norwegian register data to examine the relationship between birth spacing and the number of general practitioner consultations for physical and mental health issues (excluding pregnancy complications) for mothers and fathers in the period immediately after childbirth (1–5 and 6–11 months after childbearing), the medium-term (5-6 years after childbearing) as well as the long-term (10-11 years after childbearing). To examine short-term health outcomes, we estimate individual fixed-effects models, comparing health outcomes after different births to the same parent. We apply sibling fixed effects in our analysis of medium- and long-term outcomes, holding constant the family background of the mothers and fathers that we study. Overall, the results from our analyses are consistent with very small to negligible effects of birth spacing behavior on parental health.