Using longitudinal census and register data combined with childcare coverage rates for 588 municipalities in Belgium, Wood & Neels found that local formal childcare provision has a clear and substantial positive effect on the likelihood of having a child among dual-earner couples.

In a brand new and critical study, Bruno Schoumaker explored vital statistics, surveys and censuses from 163 countries to provide a broad overview of male fertility around the world and over time, and to identify the factors leading to differences between male and female fertility levels and trends.

Perelli-Harris et al. investigated whether individuals who cohabit have similar levels of subjective wellbeing (SWB) as married people. They studied events and characteristics correlated with entrance into marriage; whether marriage may be more advantageous for those with a lower or higher tendency to marry; and, finally, whether there is variation by country and gender between partnership type and SWB.

Jonas Helgertz (University of Minnesota and Lund University) and Anton Nilsson (Lund University) analysed full-population Swedish register data on siblings and twins born between 1973 and 1994, and followed until 2011. This is one of the first studies to look at the effect of birth weight on sick days in adulthood.