Does Order Matter? The relationship between premarital pregnancy and woman’s career interruption in South Korea

Abstract: This thesis is an initial attempt to investigate the relationship between premarital pregnancy and women’s career interruption in the Korean context. The case of marriage preceded by pregnancy has increased in South Korea in recent years. Previous studies have focused on the determinants of the premarital conception. However, little research has been done on the relationship between premarital conception and woman’s career interruption. Using the National Survey on Fertility and Family Health and Welfare data, this thesis performs multiple logistic regression analysis to investigate how a difference in sequences of marriage, pregnancy and childbirth affects the probability of quitting a job. The results show that a woman having premarital conception has a higher risk of quitting her job around the first childbirth. However, after controlling individual and occupational characteristics, this correlation weakens among the women with premarital birth, while it remains significant for the women with premarital conception and marriage before childbirth. Also, the negative impact of premarital conception and premarital birth tend to be more potent among the cohort born after 1985 and those who reside in rural areas. Also, the correlation weakens by the time of the second childbirth. The main findings indicate that the selection partly explains the difference in the likelihood of career interruption around childbirth between post-martial conception group and premarital conception group, although premarital conception may also have intrinsic effect associated with a higher risk of career interruption of the younger cohort.