MARRIAGE YES, CHILDREN NO - A LIFE-STYLE WITH A FUTURE

After referring to some relevant quantitative data concerning childles sness in the Federal Republic of Germany, a portrait of voluntarily ch ildless couples is presented. The portrait is based on a group of 18 n ewly-wed couples which, in a comprehensive longitudinal study, was com pared to several groups of young couples with a more or less positive or ambivalent motivation for parenthood. The findings attest to a spec ific profile of voluntarily childless coupling concerning such aspects as personality, marital relations, parenting competence, family of or igin relations, lifestyle and parenthood decision making. There are no indications of a general anti-child orientation of these couples. Rat her, it seems that their decision was based on an attitude of ''respon sible non-parent-hood''. Despite a growing number of women who will ne ver have children in their life, the proportion of married couples fav oring a childless lifestyle is expected to remain small.