Cohort fertility changes and period fertility in 1960-1990 in Finland

In Finland, like in most European countries, the total fertility rate declined from a level of 2.5 births per woman in the middle of the 1960s below the replacement level of 2.1 births during the late sixties. This change has been called Europe’s second demographic transition. This paper aims to describe the changes in cohort fertility during and after this transition. The cohorts whose fertility is examined include the cohorts of women bom between 1923-24 and 1961-62. The cohort fertility data are from unpublished tables of Statistics Finland. Total fertility decreased from 2.6 births per woman in the cohort 1923-24 to the level of 1.8-1.9 births per woman in the cohorts 1943-44 and has stayed at this level in younger cohorts. The most prominent change in fertility behavior in recent years has been delaying births later in life. This transformation has been going on since the cohorts born in the middle of the 1940s. In calendar time this transformation started in the late sixties which suggests that the new contraception methods played an important role in it. Cohort fertility results are used in interpreting period fertility trends and variability in the last decades

Familial, Situational, and Attitudinal Determinants of Third-Birth Intentions and Their Uncertainty

For this study, we used data from the Finnish Womans Life Course and FamilyFormation Survey to study the decision to have or not to have a third child amongwomen who had two children. Our results show that almost one half of therespondents in our sample (n=636) desired to have three or more children, but only19 per cent intended to have a third birth, while 30 per cent were uncertain abouttheir intentions. We also found that a considerable proportion of the respondentshad decided to stop childbearing at a lower parity than desired. To study whatdetermines womens decision to have a third child we estimated three logisticregression models of the determinants of third-birth intentions and their uncertainty,separately for all women at parity two and for those who desired to have three ormore children. The results indicate that the factors associated with the intention tocease childbearing differ from those associated with the certainty of intention.Familial and attitudinal factors, such as the quality of partnership, genders of theexisting children, and family values, were independently associated with womensintentions to continue childbearing after two children or stop at parity two. However,social and economic constraints made women hesitate with regard to their futurefertility plans

Neuropathologic Findings of Dementia with Lewy Bodies (DLB) in a Population-based Vantaa 85+Study

Peer reviewe

Population-based analysis of pathological correlates of dementia in the oldest old

Objective: The aim of this study was to analyze brain pathologies which cause dementia in the oldest old population. Methods: All 601 persons aged >= 85 years living in the city of Vantaa (Finland), on April 1st, 1991 formed the study population of the Vantaa85 + study, 300 of whom were autopsied during follow-up (79.5% females, mean age-at-death 92 +/- 3.7 years). Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathology (tau and beta-amyloid [Ab]), cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) and Lewy-related pathologies were analyzed. Brain infarcts were categorized by size ( 15 mm) and by location. Brain hemorrhages were classified as microscopic ( 2 mm cortical and subcortical infarcts, and (3) <2 mm cortical microinfarcts and microhemorrhages. Multipathology was common and increased the risk of dementia significantly. Interpretation: These results indicate that AD-type neurodegenerative processes play the most prominent role in twilight cognitive decline. The high prevalence of both neurodegenerative and vascular pathologies indicates that multiple preventive and therapeutic approaches are needed to protect the brains of the oldest old.Peer reviewe