Educational Assortative Mating and Changes in Fertility in Cameroon: A Decomposition Analysis

Fiennasah Akem, University of Dschang

This paper investigates the implications of educational assortative mating for changes in fertility in Cameroon over the period 2004-2018. To achieve the objectives, the paper employed Instrumental Variable Negative Binomial regression to examine the effect of positive educational assortative mating on fertility behaviour. Furthermore, used Multivariate Negative Binomial Regression decomposition to assess the specific contribution of positive educational assortative mating to changes in fertility. Results show that positive educational assortative mating is associated with decreased fertility in Cameroon. Additionally, we observed a significant decline in fertility between 2004 and 2018. Decomposition results show that returns to endowment contribute largely to the decline in fertility from 2004-2018. Furthermore, positive educational assortative mating, in terms of endowment, has a mitigating effect on fertility. Policy implications suggest that investing in education emerges as a promising long-term approach for promoting fertility reduction and ensuring demographic stability within Cameroon.