MULTIVARIATE METHOD
Strand one considers some of the possible correlates of age at motherhood from the early
life experience of the mothers of the cohort members. This analysis estimates the
following equation:
agemoth = α+ βantecedent + ε
where agemoth is the age at first motherhood grouped in three year age groups, α is the
constant, antecedent are those variables which are determined before the birth of the child
and ε is the residual. As the MCS dataset focuses on the cohort child itself, its current
family life and wider environment there is relatively little information on the early life
experience of the cohort member’s mother. The antecedent variables we can observe
consist of the mothers’ ethnic group (recorded as seven dummy variables), whether her
parents separated or divorced before the birth of the mothers’ first child and whether she
had experienced anytime in care as a child. We also treat leaving school at the
compulsory school leaving age (16 - or 15 for the few born before 1958) as antecedent,
even though in a few cases motherhood may have precipated school leaving. This
variable may not be as appropriate to those who have undertaken their education outside
of the UK as those who were educated in the UK. However it does still provide a
measure of attendance in education post 15/16 for all. In most cases we could possibly
also have treated the level of educational qualifications attained as antecedent to
motherhood, given the results of Hawkes (2003) and Ermisch and Pevalin (2003b), but
here we have been more cautious and included this element of educational history as
possibly determined concurrently or consequent upon family formation. In addition for
the sub sample of mothers, for whom the cohort member was their first child, additional
12