Investigating factors affecting the desire to have children among married men and women in Jahrom city

Introduction

Today, due to the process of urbanization, the development of societies and the expansion of mass media, and finally the phenomenon of globalization in many advanced and developing countries, the birth rate has declined to the replacement level or even lower than that. Iran is also one of the countries that has suffered a sharp drop in fertility rate in the last three decades and the aging process of the population has sounded its song. The rapid growth of the population, especially in the developing countries in the past decades, has created changes and transformations for fertility that researchers and researchers of social and human sciences have made this topic the focus of their studies and reviews in order to know the economic, social and cultural influencing factors on childbearing in order to preserve human life and in line with the quality of the population. Changes in fertility and reduction in childbearing, which is considered the demographic transition, in parallel with industrialization, increasing the quality of life and There has been an improvement in health conditions and a reduction in mortality as a result. The decrease in fertility under the influence of these changes occurred shortly after the decrease in mortality, which is related to the change in lifestyle. Because raising children in an urban and industrial lifestyle is costly and gradually destroys the values ??related to having many children.

Childbearing is an important phenomenon in demographic movements and the axis of sustainable development for countries that have a low level of succession. Although having children and giving birth seems to be a simple matter, it is a complex issue that is affected by many quantitative and qualitative factors. Knowledge of the desire to have children between married men and women and the factors affecting it will create a significant knowledge in the course of demographic changes (Berbian, 2010: 10-12). In addition, by knowing the set of effective factors, the development of plans and macro policies is overshadowed. Therefore, the lack of recognition of this important adverse demographic developments that directly affects the political, cultural and economic sectors and leads to social imbalance.

The advertisement market, strict laws and effective comments are warm in the direction of population increase, and political elites and politicians are working hard to follow the trend of population increase. According to the description of the agents of the political system, the premature aging of the population and the increase in the burden of dependents and the reduction of the active population in the future are certain, and the need to increase the population is obvious. As a rule, a scientific approach and away from tasteism prompts people of thought to investigate the issue in a scientific way and the result is beneficial to the scientific community. Therefore, in this research, by examining several social factors, an attempt is made to explain the desire to have children between married men and women. 

Statement of the problem

Today, the transformation and changes in population structure and childbearing are the focus of attention of researchers and thinkers. The main reason for the increasing attention to this phenomenon is its widespread use in the development of plans and policies of the macro-society. Because adverse demographic developments directly affect the economic, political and cultural sectors of societies and cause social imbalance. Because population has always had a close relationship with development in its various dimensions.

Decreasing the level of mortality and the relative stability of childbearing after the Second World War in less developed countries was accompanied by a rapid and unprecedented increase in population, and following that population policies were adopted to deal with the increase in population at the global and national level. In the last few decades, childbearing in most developing countries, including Iran, has been declining, and even in some of these countries, it has approached the replacement level, and in some countries, it has reached below the replacement level. Therefore, severe concerns about population growth and its negative consequences have decreased, but the main concern that has become more important than population growth in the second period of demographic transition is age composition, and its consequences are significant for policy makers and planners (Saraei, 2015, Mirzaei, 2015, Hosseini, 2016). . Although having children and giving birth seems to be a simple matter, it is a complex issue that is affected by many quantitative and qualitative factors. Knowledge of the desire to have children between married men and women and the factors affecting it will create a significant knowledge in the course of demographic changes (Berbian, 2010).

The rapid decline in fertility along with the improvement of living conditions and increase in life expectancy in Iran in the coming decades will lead to rapid changes in the age structures and the aging of the population. Currently, Iranian society is in the stage of transition of age structure from youth to old age. The increase in the growth rate of the elderly population in the coming decades has increased the burden of dependents and expanded the needs of the elderly. Statistics show that in 2013, in most provinces of the country, the total fertility rate was below the replacement level. While the demographic policies were aimed at keeping the population constant, as a rule, every woman should have 1/2 children on average, so that after the death of the parents, at least two children will replace them. Due to the decrease in the current fertility rate, in the next four decades, Iran will become an aging country and the population will collapse from the inside. Undoubtedly, the continuation of the fertility rate with the current trend will reduce the active population and increase the costs of old age. It should be noted that compared to other countries, the fertility rate in Iran in 2010 was lower than most Asian, European and Latin American countries (Aitollahi, 2012, quoted by Mubasheri et al., 2012).

During the next twenty years from 2025, Iran's population growth will decrease below one percent. Therefore, the population growth in recent years has been accompanied by a noticeable decrease and it is expected that this figure will continue in the next two decades. According to the announcement of the World Bank, the growth rate of Iran's population will reach below one percent from 2025, and Iran's population will reach 99% in 2025. The percentage will decrease (Kalantari et al. 1389: 104-83).

The rate of having children in Iran in all age groups is associated with a noticeable decrease. So that some couples prefer to start having children later, and some married women leave a gap between their children and older women stop having children. Now, some questions come to mind that despite the real human desire to have children, what factors have caused the reduction of childbearing in Iranian society? Or what factors affect the willingness of married men and women to have children? (Jean-Tom-Claude Shestland and Jean-Claude Shen, 1378).

Therefore, any action to prevent the reduction of childbearing among families requires examining the procreation tendencies of women and men and its determining factors. It can always be considered important to know the fields of the desire to have children, as well as the awareness of families and especially women who have reproductive power. Having children, which is caused by social, cultural and economic factors, is deeply related to the awareness and attitudes of women and men to the issue of having children. What prompted the researcher to choose this topic is the reduction of childbearing, which has become the most important social issue in Iran, and many politicians and political and social elites strongly discuss this issue, although some demographers criticize this phenomenon.

So that some demographers believe that due to the presence of young boys and girls ready for marriage, the decrease in birth rates will not be temporary and will not decrease to a replacement level, but if the conditions suitable for young people to marry, such as If employment and housing are provided without any promotion or encouragement, a new and abundant wave of population will arise and the demographic problem will be solved. Without a doubt, the age structure of the society is changing to old age due to the decrease in the number of births, and the burden of dependents will gradually increase, and with the decrease of the active and productive population, it will affect the process of social and economic development of the society, as well as numerous medical, economic and special issues of aging will increase. Paying attention to this issue and studying it with a sociological approach is considered important.

Importance and necessity of research

Decreasing childbearing in today's Iranian society is one of the country's major demographic issues. So that the fertility rate has decreased rapidly since the 70s. Since fertility is considered as the most important factor in population growth and its rapid decrease changes the age structure of the population in the direction of aging and leads to a decrease in the active and productive population and increases the burden of dependents. Although the elderly population currently accounts for a small share of the population, the Iranian society will experience an increase in the number of elderly people in the future due to the decrease in childbearing and the change caused by the age structure of the 20-30-year-old group.