Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Motherhood Situation And Life Satisfaction: Are Reasons For Having No Children Important?, Kari C. Gentzler

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The proportion of adult women without children in the United States has increased in recent years and there are multiple reasons women do not have children. Past research concerning the well-being of women relative to their motherhood status does not recognize the great diversity among women without children. I attempt to fill that gap by classifying women based on the presence or absence of children, fertility barriers, and childbearing intentions. The classification results in five motherhood situations: mothers, voluntarily childfree, women delaying motherhood, involuntarily childless with situational barriers and involuntarily childless with biomedical barriers. This study specifies the relationship between …