Contemporary adults often cite economic uncertainty, global warming, and increasing inequality as reasons for intending not to have children. Despite extensive research on the impact of societal pessimism on attitudes towards out‐group members, political preferences, and voting behaviors, its impact on demographic behaviors, such as fertility, has received little attention. This study examines the relationship between societal pessimism—captured through individuals' negative perception of the future of the next generation—and their likelihood of becoming a parent. Using data from the Dutch Longitudinal Internet studies for the Social Sciences (LISS), we use discrete‐time event history models to estimate the probability of becoming a parent in a given year based on respondents' self‐reported negative assessment of the future of the next generation in six distinct areas. Our results demonstrate that perceiving the future of the coming generation as worse than today is associated with a lower probability of becoming a parent. These findings suggest that surveys aimed at understanding fertility behaviors should incorporate questions about individuals' perceptions of the future, in addition to their own contemporaneous conditions.

中文翻译：

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社会悲观主义与为人父母的过渡：未来太暗淡而无法生孩子？

当代成年人经常将经济不确定性、全球变暖和不平等加剧作为不打算生孩子的原因。尽管对社会悲观主义对外群体成员的态度、政治偏好和投票行为的影响进行了广泛的研究，但它对生育率等人口行为的影响却很少受到关注。这项研究探讨了社会悲观主义（通过个人对下一代未来的负面看法而体现）与他们成为父母的可能性之间的关系。使用荷兰社会科学纵向互联网研究 (LISS) 的数据，我们使用离散时间事件历史模型，根据受访者自我报告的对未来的负面评估，估计在给定年份成为父母的概率。下一代在六个不同领域。我们的研究结果表明，认为下一代的未来比今天更糟糕与成为父母的可能性较低有关。这些发现表明，旨在了解生育行为的调查除了个人当时的状况外，还应该纳入有关个人对未来的看法的问题。