A comparison of the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS) and the 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS70) found that the median age of first-time motherhood rose by one and a half years for women in the 1970 generation compared to those born in 1958. Women with degree-level qualifications were most likely to postpone childbirth.
The CLOSER studies have also revealed how women’s employment breaks after having children have shortened in recent decades. For example, only one fifth of women in the MRC National Survey of Health and Development (1946 British birth cohort) had returned to work within a year of giving birth to their first child, compared to two fifths in NCDS and around half of mothers in BCS70.