https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7677-5759
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ABSTRACT
The article further develops the term ‘high infant mortality trap’ as an expression of the concept supposing a mutual relationship between short average birth intervals (corresponding usually to high fertility) and high level of infant mortality. This mutual relationship is among other a consequence of the effect of the same or similar factors standing behind both processes (fertility, infant mortality). In the paper, this relationship is evaluated through the effect of the selected explanatory variables on the probability of infant death (using the Binomial logistic regression) as well as length of birth-birth intervals or time duration from the infant death to the successive birth (using the Cox regression). In the analytical part, the concept is evaluated using data from two localities in Bohemia (today the Czech Republic). The localities differ according the socio-economic as well as ethnic characteristics, what might have affected also the demographic behaviour. The area of the Central Europe has not been fully described in the historical demographic works yet, so this study brings the possibility of comparison of this area with other areas already studied. Particular parts of the analysis prove the assumption of the existence of the high infant mortality trap before the onset of demographic transition.
Acknowledgments
This work has been supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic under Grant 15-19601S ‘The Early Stage of Transformation of the Reproductive Behaviour in Bohemia from the Second Half of the 18th Century to the End of the 19th Century’ and by the Charles University Research Centre program UNCE/HUM/018.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. Frequency of intercourse ranks among biological factors, unless it includes voluntary abstinence from sex that is used as a birth control method. In such a case, it is classified among behavioural factors as a contraceptive method.
2. For example, in the Czech lands in 1830 − 1838 life expectancy was 28.2 years. In 1830−1834 infant mortality on this territory was 264 per mille (Srb, Citation2004, pp. 194−195).
3. Even Knodel (Citation1968, p. 300) in his paper mentions a higher level of infant (child) mortality due to less care in families with a large number of children. This corresponds to a Bavarian comment dating back to the year 1800: ‘A farmer is happy when his wife gives him the first fruit of their love, he is happy when the second and third children are born, but with the fourth the joy is not so great. In such a case, worries come instead of joy. He starts regretting that he is the father of so many children because he cannot provide for them as his possessions are too small. He sees all additional children as enemies who sponge on him and his family. Even the kindest mother’s heart starts being ignorant with the fifth child and with the sixth, she wishes that the child went to the heaven as soon as possible.’ (van Dülmen, Citation1999, p. 93). This idea suggests that as early as the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries (which means prior to the onset of the demographic transition), the rural population was considering the size of their families and the desired (though rarely implemented) limitation of family size. On the other hand, the text also mentions the mortality of infants in the case of higher-order births. This implies that the order of children cited above refers to surviving children not children by order of birth.
4. When distinguishing the category of unknown survival status in the analytical models (not shown here), the results of this category were numerically very similar and statistically not significantly different from the category of survival of the infant period.