Childbearing Tendency and Related Factors Among Married Women in Rasht City, north of Iran

Reducing childbirth rates is a serious problem in some countries. Iran is one of the countries experiencing a decrease in the fertility rate, with a more than 50% decrease in avery’s child statistics.

This study aimed to determine childbearing desire and its related factors among married women.

In this cross-sectional study, 550 women aged 15 to 49 referring to comprehensive health centers in Rasht City were selected by multi-stage random sampling. Information was collected using a questionnaire consisting of three parts. The audience was asked about their willingness to have children in the personal and social profile section, the fertility information section, and the third section that to detect degree of desire to have children. Descriptive statistics and the chi-square and logistic regression were used to investigate the factors affecting the reluctance to have children.

The results of the research showed that the mean age of the women, the spouse, the age at marriage, and the duration of their marriage were 31.57±6.2, 35.69±6.6, 22.42±4.52, and 9.05±6.5 years, respectively and 54.9% of women were currently willing to have children. The relationship between unwillingness to have children was significant regarding the husband’s age (OR=1.112, 95% CI, 1.050%-1.177%, P=0.001). Also, the relationship between reluctance to have children and the age at marriage was not significant; however, it became significant with the length of marriage (OR=1.090, 95% CI, 1.019%-1.167%, P=0.013). The relationship between unwillingness to have children and the women’s opinion about the desired number of children was significant (OR=8.101, 95% CI, 3.518%-18.654%, P=0.001). The relationship between unwillingness to have children and the number of current children was significant (OR=16.515,95% CI, 8.293%-32.888%, P=0.001).

Our analysis showed that the inability to accept the responsibility of being a parent is one of the reasons why people postpone childbearing to the fourth decade of life and even beyond. Detailed studies are needed to correct the current trend of population decline.