Economics and fertility: Changing family structure among Chamorros on the island of Guam

Type Journal Article - The History of the Family
Title Economics and fertility: Changing family structure among Chamorros on the island of Guam
Author(s)
Volume 6
Issue 1
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2001
Page numbers 95-123
Publisher Taylor & Francis
URL https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1016/S1081-602X(01)00064-1
Abstract
This study explains the fertility transition among Guam's people from natural high to controlled low fertility over several generations. Descriptive statistics from US Census data from 1901?1990 illustrate that Guam experienced a demographic transition beginning before World War II. Descriptive statistics comparing Guam with the analyses of the original value of children (VOC) studies demonstrate that Chamorros are similar to other Americans in valuing children for the social?psychological satisfactions they provide. However, Chamorros continue to emphasize child-rearing values of discipline and respect, a characteristic found only among Filipinos in the original VOC countries. This social structural change in the composition of Guam families is the result of changing economic conditions and the subsequent changes in the social?psychological VOC to Guam families, as the island has undergone modernization and development. The changes in the social?psychological values of children are social transformations in what having and raising children means to people.