Updating the Life Cycle of the Family

Changes from decade to decade in family life cycle patterns are analyzed for women who have married in the 20th Century. Longtime changes in the median age of women upon entering life cycle stages have occurred primarily because of fluctuations in birth rates and improvement in survival rates. A noteworthy recent development is the continuing postponement of marriage. Women entering marriage during the 1970s are expected to have between one and two fewer children to end childbearing three years sooner and to have 11 more years of married life after the last child marries than women who married during the first decade of the century. (authors)