Haitian Attitudes Toward Family Size

Abstract

Over the past decade a number of studies of attitudes toward family size have been conducted in underdeveloped countries. The results of such investigations have been surprisingly similar. When lower income, poorly educated women in Lebanon, Peru, or India are asked for their ideal family size or the number of children they desire, the responses cluster around three or four children. Such findings have surprised intellectuals in countries concerned, since the stereotypic belief about ideal family size is that lower class women want an unlimited or large number of children, or that they do not care how many they have.