INTRODUCTION

Fertility refers to the actual production of children, which in the strictest sense is a biological process. A zygote is produced when the sperm of a male and the egg of a female are united, and around nine months later a baby is born. Most often in this process, though not always, a man and a woman have sexual intercourse, the woman conceives, and the conception results in a live birth. Even though the production of a child is a biological process, the various activities and events that lead to the act of sexual intercourse and, later, to giving birth are affected by the social, economic, cultural, and psychological characteristics of the woman and the man, as well as by the environment in which they live. The key to this seeming paradox is that engaging in intercourse, conceiving, and giving birth are themselves behaviors that are influenced by other factors, most of them social and cultural. So while we have no influence at all with regard to the family and parents we receive when we are born, we do have a significant influence on our own fertility, that is, whether or not we produce children, and if so, the number and timing of the children produced. That is, whether we decide to engage in sexual intercourse, whether this intercourse results in a conception, and whether a live birth is the outcome are all driven largely by social and cultural considerations.