A study of cohort life cycles: Cohorts of native born Massachusetts women, 1830–1920

Abstract

This paper expands the conceptual apparatus offamily life cycle analysis and illustrates its usefulness by applying it to a population. There is a normatively sanctioned life cycle that a female born into American society is expected to follow as she moves from birth to death: she is expected to survive through childhood, marry, bear and rear children, and survive jointly with her husband until her children leave the home. Paul Glick, in several articles, has calculated mean ages at which these various events are experienced. The life cycle analysis proposed here, however, focuses on the distribution of women according to type of life cycle experienced. Starting with a cohort of 100,000 females, six alternative life cycle possibilities are differentiated and the number who follow each of the types is calculated. The six types are: (1) abbreviated, the female dies before she is exposed to the risk of marriage; (2) spinster, the woman is exposed to the risk of marriage but does not marry; (3) barren, the woman marries but remains childless; (4) dying mother, the woman has children but dies before the last one leaves home; (5) widowed mother, the woman has children and survives until they leave home, but her husband dies before that event; and (6) typical, the woman marries, has children, and survives jointly with her husband until the last one leaves home. Applying this approach to several cohorts of native-born Massachusetts women born at different times some striking changes appear. For example, the number of women from a birth cohort of 100,000 who follow the typical life cycle increases from 21,000 for the cohort born in 1830 to 57,000 for the cohort born in 1920. The demographic, social and economic implications of a change of this magnitude are of considerable consequence.