[Effects of the late marriage of Korean women on the first-birth interval].
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of women's late age of marriage on the interval between marriage and their first birth.


METHODS
Data from Year 2000 Korea National Fertility Survey was collected through direct interview questionings, and the data was analyzed based on randomly selected sampling. In particular, the married women (N=5,648) were analyzed for the factors that determined the first-birth interval by performing Cox's proportional hazard model survival analysis.


RESULTS
Unlike previous findings, the woman whose age of marriage was 30 or more was more likely to delay the birth of her first baby than were the other women who married earlier. Further, a woman's age at marriage, a woman's residence before marriage, her husband's religion, her husband's level of education and the difference in age between the woman and her husband significantly influenced the first-birth interval. In contrast, for a married woman, her age, level of education, current residence and religion were not significant predictors of her first birth interval.


CONCLUSIONS
Our study showed that women who married at the age of 30 years or more tend to postpone their first birth in Korea. When facing the increasing number of women who marry at a late age, the Korean government should implement population and social policies to encourage married women have their first child as early as possible.
Chung
Woojin
W
Graduate School of Public Health, Yonsei University. wchung@yumc.yonsei.ac.kr
Lee
Kyoungae
K
Lee
Sunmi
S
D000328:Adult; D001721:Birth Intervals / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007723:Korea; D008393:Marriage / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008423:Maternal Age; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012067:Religion; D012111:Residence Characteristics