Working Papers del DiSIA
Parental Separation and Its Impact on Childhood Vaccination: Evidence from Italy
Raffaele Guetto, Valentina Tocchioni, Maria Veronica Dorgali, Alice Dominici
Research on the effects of parental separation on children’s socioeconomic outcomes is extensive, yet little is known about how family disruptions impact adherence to vaccination schedules. This study addresses this gap by investigating the association between parental separation and children's vaccination coverage, using a unique dataset on Italian parents born between 1954 and 1983. A multinomial logistic regression model is used to assess the relationship between parental separation and adherence to the vaccination schedule, accounting for the child’s age at the time of parental break-up. Our results show that children who experience parental separation are less likely to receive all recommended vaccinations and are more likely to receive only mandatory vaccines or none at all. The negative effect is particularly pronounced for children who were younger at the time of separation. Given the rising incidence of family disruptions, these findings have important policy implications for improving vaccination uptake.
Working Papers del Dipartimento
The End of an Era. The Vanishing Negative Effect of Women’s Employment on Fertility
Anna Matysiak, Daniele Vignoli
This paper addresses whether women’s employment in the 21st century remains a barrier to family formation, as it was in the 1980s and 1990s, or—similar to men’s—it has become a prerequisite for childbearing. We address this question through a systematic quantitative review (meta-analysis) of empirical studies conducted in Europe, North America and Australia. We selected 94 studies published between 1990-2023 (N=572 effect sizes). Our analysis uncovers a fundamental shift in the relationship between women's employment and fertility. What was once a strongly negative association has become statistically insignificant in the 2000s and 2010s—and even turned positive in the Nordic countries and parts of Western Europe (France, Belgium, and the Netherlands). This shift is evident both among childless women and mothers and has occurred across all analyzed country clusters, except in the German/Southern European group, where the relationship has remained negative. These findings challenge longstanding assumptions about work-family trade-offs and suggest a reconfiguration of the economic and social conditions underpinning fertility decisions in contemporary high-income societies. The paper calls for a reconceptualization of the employment-fertility relationship and development of a new theoretical framework that better captures these evolving dynamics in contemporary high-income societies.
Working Papers del Dipartimento
Ultimo aggiornamento 23 aprile 2025.