This book is the first of its kind to incorporate subjective well-being (SWB) data to
comprehensively explore perceptional factors that relate to fertility behavior in East Asia.
The advantage of SWB data lies in the accessibility to rich information regarding perceptions
attitudes and behaviors. With this advantage the book inquires into the perceptions toward
family and work and explores the attitudes that lead to low fertility in the region. To this
end first a comparative analysis with international cross-sectional data is performed and the
East Asian characteristics of family and work perceptions are documented. Then three
democracies in the region are focused on-Japan South Korea and Taiwan-to investigate the
relationships between cultural orientations work-life balance and fertility outcomes with
panel data. In addition East Asian results are compared with those in India which has also
been experiencing a rapid transition from a traditional society to an industrial one. The
results support the idea that the friction between persistent gender-based role divisions and
socioeconomic transformation in East Asia makes it difficult for women to balance family and
work prompting fertility decline to the lowest-low level in the region.
