A Girl and a Boy, Are a Bundle of Joy: A Rise in Gender‐Equitable Fertility Preferences in India

Abstract

AbstractWithin the last decade, declining son preference in Asia has given rise to gender‐equitable fertility preferences. These include daughter preference, gender indifference, and gender balance. Using five rounds of the India National Family Health Surveys, I investigate the sources of the trends in shifting parental preferences for the gender of their children. Over more than a quarter‐century period (1992–1993 to 2019–2021), I find a significant decline in son preference from 40 to 18 percent and an increase in gender‐equitable preferences among most subpopulations. Multivariate analysis shows that for all survey years, education and frequent exposure to television significantly increased the odds of gender‐equitable preferences. In the last decade, community norms supporting women's employment are also associated with gender‐equitable preferences. In addition, decomposition analysis shows that compared to compositional change, social norm change accounts for two‐thirds of the rise in gender‐equitable preferences. These findings suggest that rising norms of gender equality have the potential to dismantle gender‐biased preferences in India.