查看文章

The Families, Fertility and the Future study was prompted by increasing public concern over Australia’s falling national birthrate and on-going political debate regarding the role and provision of paid maternity leave and other initiatives designed to encourage or support those Australians planning or raising families.

We looked at the specific groups in contemporary Australia: women or men with no children; women or men with one child; women or men with two or more children; young women or men (under twenty-six years); and women raising children alone, who have attracted attention in the national debate about population, fertility and the future. We concentrated on these groups, ones on which media and policy makers have been focused, in order to find out what it that these women and men really think and what’s important to them when they decide whether or not to have children.