EMPLOYMENT AND FAMILY FORMATION AMONG ETHNIC MINORITIES SOCIALISED IN THE UK

Starting with the post-war influx of immigrants, there has steadily developed a large ethnic minority population in the UK, mostly hailing from South Asia, Africa and the Caribbean. The immigrant population in the UK has inspired interest both among academic researchers and policy makers, and there exists today a substantial body of research on ethnic minority groups in the UK - migrants as well as their descendants. However, there is relatively little known about how, within these groups, decision making related to paid employment and family formation are evolving with time and across generations. For women particularly, decisions on family formation and economic activity are not independent of each other, and are usually a result of joint decision making. As social and cultural norms are an important influencing factor in many life decisions, especially for women, there is a pressing need to incorporate ethnic differences, and the differing socio-cultural norms that accompany these differences, in the analysis of the joint decision making process that determines labour force participation and family formation of women in the UK. Such an analysis is of special relevance for individuals belonging to 1.5+ generations - those who were born in the UK, or brought here at a very young age, so as to have spent most or all of their formative years in UK society. Such individuals are simultaneously exposed to the cultural and social norms of their origin country (via family members, with at least one parent or grandparent having spent a majority of their lives in the origin country) as well as those of mainstream 'white' UK society. The interplay between these two very distinct cultural influences may not only contribute to conflict between the individual and the family, but is also likely to manifest itself in decision making related to employment and family formation, where younger generations may choose to diverge from traditional behavioral norms of the community. The chief objective of my research is to analyse ethnic differences in the joint decision making process that determines labour force participation and partnership/family formation of women in UK, focusing particularly on ethnic minority women from the 1.5+ generation. In particular, some research questions that I am eager to investigate in the course of my PhD are as follows:

1. How do pregnancy and childbirth impact women's economic activity and career progression, and how does this relationship vary across ethnic groups? How do neighbourhood effects mediate this relationship in case of ethnic minority women? Are there temporal variations with regard to decisions related to balancing motherhood and one's career, especially between first generation migrants and those belonging to the 1.5 generation? What is the role of economic factors vis-à-vis cultural factors - within a community, do there exist behavioral heterogeneities based on factors such as partnership status, education level or household income? As social integration occurs over time, do cultural factors lose their significance in the decision making process?

2. How do fertility preferences and choice of education level interact with each other? When are fertility preferences formed and how do they impact girls' educational attainment? How does this relationship vary with social class, country of origin and generation?