Infant-feeding practices and infant survival by familial wealth in London, 1752-1812

Anecdotal evidence indicates that high-status women in England generally did not breastfeed their children in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Metropolitan families of varied social status also often sent their children out of London for wet-nursing. However, anecdotal sources and rur...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Bibliographische Detailangaben
Veröffentlicht in:The history of the family : an international quarterly. - 1996. - 24(2019), 1 vom: 27., Seite 174-206
1. Verfasser: Davenport, Romola Jane (VerfasserIn)
Format: Online-Aufsatz
Sprache:English
Veröffentlicht: 2019
Zugriff auf das übergeordnete Werk:The history of the family : an international quarterly
Schlagworte:Journal Article Infant mortality breastfeeding smallpox urban mortality wet-nursing
LEADER 01000caa a22002652 4500
001 NLM296777773
003 DE-627
005 20240716232159.0
007 cr uuu---uuuuu
008 231225s2019 xx |||||o 00| ||eng c
024 7 |a 10.1080/1081602X.2019.1580601  |2 doi 
028 5 2 |a pubmed24n1472.xml 
035 |a (DE-627)NLM296777773 
035 |a (NLM)31058272 
040 |a DE-627  |b ger  |c DE-627  |e rakwb 
041 |a eng 
100 1 |a Davenport, Romola Jane  |e verfasserin  |4 aut 
245 1 0 |a Infant-feeding practices and infant survival by familial wealth in London, 1752-1812 
264 1 |c 2019 
336 |a Text  |b txt  |2 rdacontent 
337 |a ƒaComputermedien  |b c  |2 rdamedia 
338 |a ƒa Online-Ressource  |b cr  |2 rdacarrier 
500 |a Date Revised 16.07.2024 
500 |a published: Electronic-eCollection 
500 |a Citation Status PubMed-not-MEDLINE 
520 |a Anecdotal evidence indicates that high-status women in England generally did not breastfeed their children in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Metropolitan families of varied social status also often sent their children out of London for wet-nursing. However, anecdotal sources and rural burial registers also suggest that these practices declined rapidly from the mid-eighteenth century, and were replaced by a culture of maternal breastfeeding in all social classes. These changes in infant-feeding practices have been argued to explain much of the dramatic improvement in infant mortality rates in London in this period. Here we used quantitative evidence from a partial family reconstitution of the London parish of St. Martin in the Fields to test these claims. Using birth interval analysis to infer breastfeeding patterns in families by four categories of wealth, we found that birth intervals were close to the national average in pauper and poor families, but much shorter in wealthier families, in the period 1752-74. We also found evidence that many infants especially in wealthier families were missing from observation, consistent with high levels of rural wet-nursing. Both these phenomena declined between 1775 and 1812, suggesting a convergence in breastfeeding practices to the national norm. We used event history analysis, with corrections to aggregate rates for missing infants, to compare mortality rates over time and by wealth category. We found that infant mortality was initially higher in wealthier families, but declined in all groups over the period 1752-1812. We conclude that increases in maternal breastfeeding were probably important in improving survival of infants from wealthier families, however changes in breastfeeding patterns were insufficient to account for the ubiquitous improvements in mortality of urban-born infants in this period 
650 4 |a Journal Article 
650 4 |a Infant mortality 
650 4 |a breastfeeding 
650 4 |a smallpox 
650 4 |a urban mortality 
650 4 |a wet-nursing 
773 0 8 |i Enthalten in  |t The history of the family : an international quarterly  |d 1996  |g 24(2019), 1 vom: 27., Seite 174-206  |w (DE-627)NLM098253433  |x 1081-602X  |7 nnns 
773 1 8 |g volume:24  |g year:2019  |g number:1  |g day:27  |g pages:174-206 
856 4 0 |u http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1081602X.2019.1580601  |3 Volltext 
912 |a GBV_USEFLAG_A 
912 |a SYSFLAG_A 
912 |a GBV_NLM 
912 |a GBV_ILN_350 
951 |a AR 
952 |d 24  |j 2019  |e 1  |b 27  |h 174-206