The more intelligent a woman is, the less likely she is to have children

[Wuldric]

From the Times, today

"Satoshi Kanazawa, a researcher at the London School of Economics, has begun positing evidence that the more intelligent women are, the less likely they are to seek offspring. Kanazawa analysed Britain?s National Child Development Study and discovered that high intellect correlated with an early resolve toward, and lifelong pursuit of, childlessness.
Among females, an increase of 15 IQ points decreased the odds of their becoming a mother by a quarter. When he added controls for economics and education, the results were identical: youthful intelligence was a predictor of childlessness."

The article is a bit rubbish, in many ways, not least of which is referring to women who choose to have children as 'breeders'. But it is interesting to read that the latest estimates suggest that a quarter of British women of childbearing age will never have a baby, and by and large, it is the intelligent women who forego children.

Thoughts?

Blimey.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Kanazawa

I do have children myself but I was very interested to see that the more choices women have, the less inclined they are to have children.

Jezebel

My IQ has decreased,when doing the standard test, since I've had children. Would the measurement have been me pre or post birth?

But Wuldric, surely that's numerically right if nothing else?

Gotta say, not massively impressed by other things this guy has done...

But haven't we known that the more choices women have, the less inclined they have to have children for ages? If that is part of this paper, it isn't new research at all.

That is a truth wekk-known for women in developing nations. I do not know that we have appreciated here, in a western developed economy. Maybe the data was there all along, but I for one did not know about it.

If you look at studies of what happens with the pill, it's pretty obvious.

I still don't have your link to his study - sorry, am I being daft? It's not been linked to/the reference given?

But from what's said, he's talking about the correlation of 'intelligence' and wanting children. Intelligence would provide a very specific set of choices, as would (say) the pill. It seems to me possible that more choices of whatever kind would lead fewer women to have children, but you'd have to do a bit more than that to indicate it's the intelligence per se.

I think, anyhow.

I would say there is:
shit that society gives you when you are a woman
shit that society gives you when you are a woman with children
and
shit that society gives you when you are a woman without children (and this can be separated out into whether they regard you as pre-children or never-having-children)

I'm not saying that one is worse than the other, but there is some different shit.

LRD - yes I think it probably boils down to more choices = fewer children (on average). Many women will choose to have lots of children (so please don't give examples, we'r talking about averages!), but others will choose not to, if they are given the choice.

The White Queen makes me think of this a bit - it's all very well for Elizabeth Woodville to be popping out a baby nearly every year when she clearly finds pregnancy a breeze and childbirth nearly as easy, and has other people to run the house and look after all the children, but I'd hate to be a poorer woman in that time.

From reading the article, I don't really think it was a study of the research, rather an 'opinion type' piece by the author about why she, and various other high profile women have chosen not to have children. She used an evidently rubbish piece of research to justify her position that intelligent women are choosing not to have children. I know many, many women in my age group who have chosen not to have children. Some love children but don't want their own, some aren't bothered enough about it to find a partner and don't really want children but feel they should have them because it's the 'done thing' (personally, I think this accounts more than anything else for the drop in the number of 'educated' women having children- in previous generations, it was expected of you, whether you wanted to or not, now the ones who don't want to are making a choice not to) and some dislike children. Only one hasn't because she hasn't found the right man. We are all 40 or over, so the likelihood of them changing their mind is minimal, I would have though. I have children, and it makes me feel less guilty about the state of the planet if others aren't having children. I do worry about the burgeoning popuation, but the desire in me to have a child was too strong. For others, it isn't. Live and let live. Praise be that we have a choice!

I read this article this morning and instantly commented to my DH "what a load of bollocks!!" I work in a medical scientific field with many people considered 'highly intelligent and educated'.
(Yes before stroppy pants get on their high horse, I know there are many types of intellect but I can only comment on the people around me friends/colleagues etc)....
I work with many women in their late 30's/40's that never had kids but because the majority of them never met the right person or in time to do so. The 'study' didn't take into account that maybe educated intelligent women (their words not mine) may have been putting off having children because of their career?? I think that there are stats to show that professional women have children later than non professional. Maybe they are also fussier when choosing a spouse?? Too many flaws in this study!!

It was a rubbish article - annoying and snide. Of course it's a perfectly reasonable choice not to have children, but quite why she then has to validate that choice by sneering at people who've made different choices I wasn't at all clear.

This thread, on the other hand, is really interesting. I agree with others that it probably boils down to "more choices = less likely to have children", and the more "intelligent" / highly educated you are the more choices you're likely to have.

There must be some correlation for men, mustn't there? If only because intelligent men are fairly likely to marry / partner intelligent women (DH and I have two degrees and a professional qualification each), so intelligent men must be a bit less likely than others to have children, even if only because of their wives' choices.

I was very nearly childless-by-choice, incidentally. I'm intelligent by conventional measures, never wanted children in the abstract and my career is very important to me. But I married someone who did want them and - crucially - was prepared to step up and become the main carer while I carried on working unencumbered. That isn't a choice that a huge number of other women have got, and I would never have had a child on other terms. (We only have one, but that's for health/ sanity rather than career reasons.)

trills - wasn't about to give examples.

Dogs I've certainly read discussion about this being a "people" effect rather than a "women" effect; and debate about whether more "intelligent" people having fewer children adversely impacts on the gene-pool or whether regression to mean and random effects mean that it doesn't make much difference to future generations. (I think the latter is probably most likely).

Desire to have children, and strength of that desire is probably at least partially attributed to hormone balance, which may be part genetic and part environmental; but ability to fulfil choices related to those desires are almost certainly environmental/circumstantial.

Glad some people have pointed out & given links to what a dodgy person the researcher in question is - in addition to the 'black women are objectively less attractive, no, really' thing he also said that to bring a quick end to the "War on Terror" the US should really have dropped 35 nuclear bombs on the Middle East on September 12. Er?????

When I read this comment it made me feel quite sad that these stereotypes about (intelligent) childfree women still exist. I have hundreds of friends who I made whilst at Cambridge University and the vast majority of them are happily married, some with children and some without. Of those who dont have children, I can honestly say that they are amongst the most caring, warm, emphatic people I have ever met. They are busy dedicating their lives to causes they are passionate about, whether that's being a NHS surgeon or GP, vet, charity worker, cancer researcher, climate change researcher, the list goes on. This stereotype about childfree/less women (and men) being cold and lacking empathy must stop. These characteristics are not the preserve of parents alone and indeed, some parents themselves lack these qualities! There are many reasons why people (including very intelligent women) may choose not to have children these days, including financial, health and environmental reasons amongst many others.

Well said!

Lotta 's point was a good one, that intelligent women obviously do have children so perhaps it's more about freedom of choice, breadth of opportunity and wider choices of self image, that more women make choices of career/lifestyle that doesn't involve children.

It's struck me lately: of the friendship group of four women I went through school with, three post grad qualified and one easily could have if she'd wanted to, only one married for about six months before realising it was a mistake. Since then three out of the four have intentionally chosen single lives, spend their time on their work, friends and interests and very much enjoy it. They like the independence. It's not been that long historically that ordinary women could have the education, career and income to be able to make those kind of choices.

This is a zombie thread from 2013. It's probably worth starting a completely new one at this point if you think it's worth resurrecting the discussion, as (probably) relatively few of the posters who were on here first time round will still be around.

If I remember correctly, IQ correlates to the ability to delay gratification. I think that could easily relate to fewer pregnancies.

It’s the usual conflation of class and educational opportunities and IQ. People of upper classes have fewer kids because they are better Educated and have access to reliable contraception (financially better off)

As women’s educational achievement increases, birth rate drops. It’s a world wide phenomenon since the advent of birth control.

I think women with high IQs as measured by traditional biased means have fewer children because they over-think it.

They lap up the narrative that one should finish degrees, get a good career, buy a house, have lots of cash money in the bank and only then try for a child. Unfortunately, by the time they complete their self imposed checklist, they are often too old, infertile and cannot afford IVF for more than one precious baby.

It’s sad really the shift we’ve seen in society of women delaying childbearing to their peak earning years. It makes zero sense. Women would be better off having kids younger and then having an uninterrupted career.

OK, if we are going to resurrect this zombie thread.

Correlation is not causation.

If you want to extend your education to degree and postgraduate level, and want to establish your career before having children, you are going to have to delay starting a family. Delaying starting a family leaves less time in which to have children (and in some instances, may mean a woman's fertility has already started to decline by the time she starts trying to have children).

It's not "higher education = desire for less children" (though modest level of education - literacy and finishing high school - is associated with giving women the background information and independence to say "you know what, dying in childbirth after child number 10 doesn't seem a brilliant idea.") It's "getting that higher education = altering the circumstances of your life such that having loads of children can't be fitted into the remaining timeframe."

Incidentally, I suspect (looking at the way figures for numbers of children decline with educational level world wide) most women want some variation on the heir and the spare - between 2 and 4 children (obviously there's a minority who want none, and a minority who actively want 10, but most women want something in between the extremes). Education - knowing what's out there in the way of contraception, education and literacy giving them the sense of self-worth and independence to chase up those contraceptive options - means most women are then in a position to say "you know what, 2 or 3 will do me just fine."

In an overpopulated world, having fewer children can only be a good thing. Contraception, education and feminism giving women control and choice over their reproduction- also a good thing.
Fears that intelligence will be “bred out” as dim women have bigger families, are misplaced. The heritability of intelligence is not that simple. Even if it were, intelligent men are still having offspring.
I had two DC. I’m a retired doctor with an IQ of 144. The majority of my female colleagues also had DC - two of them had 4 each! So it’s just a trend, not an absolute.

The "intelligence will be bred out" myth is the grubby legacy of the appalling eugenics movements of the 20s and 30s - and led to the forced sterilization and incarcertaion of tens of thousands of women (not just in Nazi Germany, but in the UK, USA, and Sweden, among others).