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Are births underreported in rural China? Manipulation of statistical records in response to China’s population policies

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Demography

Abstract

Under the current family planning policy in China, the criterion for evaluating all parties involved in the birth planning system provides an incentive for everyone to see that the policy is met, either in reality through strict enforcement of family planning regulations, or statistically through manipulation of statistical records. We investigate underreporting of births in four rural counties of northern China, using data from a 1992 sample survey featuring a reproductive history. To clarify the mechanisms of underreporting, we focus on the ways in which reporting errors may affect the distribution of first births by time since marriage. The results of our investigation suggest that in three of the four counties, first-birth intervals are lengthened by underreporting of girl babies and by replacing them with second births reported as first births.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Demography and Ecology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1180 Observatory Drive, 53706, Madison, WI

    M. Giovanna Merli

  2. Department of Statistics and Department of Sociology, University of Washington, USA

    Adrian E. Raftery

Authors
  1. M. Giovanna Merli
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  2. Adrian E. Raftery
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Correspondence to M. Giovanna Merli.

Additional information

Preparation of this paper was supported in part by a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to the University of Pennsylvania (Professor Herbert Smith, principal investigator) and by a Mellon postdoctoral fellowship when the first author was at the Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology at the University of Washington. Thanks are due to Herbert Smith for the valuable suggestions and comments he has provided since the inception of this research, and to Paul Allison, William Lavely, Samuel Preston, two anonymous reviewers, and the editors for helpful comments.

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Merli, M.G., Raftery, A.E. Are births underreported in rural China? Manipulation of statistical records in response to China’s population policies. Demography 37, 109–126 (2000). https://doi.org/10.2307/2648100

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