A Study in Family Health: (I) Health in Relation to Family Size

¹ The Maudsley Hospital, Denmark Hill, London, S.E.5
² Bexley Hospital, Dartford Heath, Bexley, Kent

1. The health of parents and children in a random sample of 499 urban families was determined by household interviews with the parents and from records kept by general practitioners. The rates for various indices of physical and mental ill-health are examined by family size.

2. For mothers, and to a less extent for fathers, rates of physical and mental ill-health increased with family size. For children, rates of ill-health and of behaviour disorders were steady in families of up to three children but decreased in larger families.

3. The lower rates of ill-health and behaviour disorders observed in children of larger families are probably to be explained on the grounds that information was derived from the mothers and that in larger families a mother cannot give as much attention to the minor ailments of each child.

4. The higher rates of ill-health in the parents of larger families, particularly in the mothers, probably reflect the increased strain imposed on them by caring for a larger number of children.