Papers of BAS

Papers of BAS. Humanities and Social Sciences

Vol. 11, 2024, No. 1

Measures of cohort fertility in Bulgaria

Stanislava Moraliyska-Nikolova

Abstract. This research work represents a multifaceted and detailed study of the changes observed in the age-specific fertility model in Bulgaria over the last few decades. The focus here is on the cohort approach, because cohort fertility in our country has not been studied since the middle of the last century, and the transition to birth postponement can be clearly captured and measured precisely from a cohort perspective.

This study deals with identifying the course of transition to birth postponement, its beginning and current stage of development, all this based on data analysis. The scale and influence of delayed births on the observed low fertility during the last three decades in Bulgaria was assessed in a cohort and period perspective. We focused some of our efforts on making a forecast of the levels of completed cohort fertility rate for women of the generations born before 1990 in Bulgaria who are still within fertile age.

Keywords: fertility, age-specific fertility, postponed births, quantum effect, tempo effect, completed cohort fertility, lowest-low fertility, forecasts

Papers of BAS. Humanities and Social Sciences

Vol. 10, 2023, No. 2

A modern view on aspects of nuptiality in Bulgaria -

a period analysis for the period 1990-2022

Stanislava Moraliyska-Nikolova

Abstract. The aim of this study is to identify the course of change in the nuptiality pattern in Bulgaria in the period after 1990. There has been a significant increase in the average age at first marriage over the past three decades. The main difference between the established in the last century model of universal and early marriage in Bulgaria and the modern model of nuptiality, which expresses the most radical change in it, is related precisely to the late start of the family formation and the first marriage. This study is entirely focused on the fundamental demographic parameters of statutory marriage, i.e., age and sex. For the purposes of this study are traced the changes produced in the first marriage timing among men and women. The change to the age-specific nuptiality model coupled with the increase in the average ages of concluding a first marriage lets confirm the hypothesis on the course of the process of first marriage postponement for a later stage within an individual life cycle.

Keywords: nuptiality, postponement of first marriage, age-specific nuptiality model