- The Fight to Spread Life
- Posts
- Do the Amish control birth?
Do the Amish control birth?
Apparently sometimes
While a little less than a third of births in the United States are outside of marriage, this is less than 2% among the Amish.
Among Pennsylvania Dutch speakers, there is possible evidence of control behavior (whether stopping or spacing cannot be said from these data) around ages 35 to 39.
The fact that the subsample indicative of the most traditionalism (Pennsylvania Dutch speakers without phones on farms) exhibited no evidence of control and has marital fertility rates around 11 children per woman likely suggests that the strictest Amish sects continue to experience natural fertility, while evidence for broader samples may suggest adoption of some forms of reproductive control among less-strict Amish denominations.
So, there is cultural variation in adherence- and the ones that allow phones have more evidence of birth control.