The Centre for Fertility and Health is a Norwegian Centre of Excellence at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. The scientific goal of the Centre is to greatly advance the understanding the causes and consequences changes in patterns of fertility and family structure, and how these changes influence child and adult health through social and biological pathways.
Our research focus on the changes in patterns of fertility and family structure observed over the last decades. These include increasing age at childbirth, a lower number of children born to each woman or man, greater use of assisted reproductive technologies, higher frequency of family disruptions, and increasingly complex family structures.
Elucidation of the complex biological and social causal mechanisms requires broad expertise. Our multidisciplinary research team consists of epidemiologists, geneticists, demographers, medical doctors, sociologists, economists, psychologists and statisticians from Norway and abroad. We have six integrated themes of research:
-Maternal and paternal age. We investigate the impact of maternal and paternal age at childbirth on subfertility, pregnancy outcomes, and consequences for parental and child health.
-Infertility, subfertility and assisted reproductive technologies. We investigate causes and consequences of infertility and health consequences of subfertility and assisted reproductive technologies in parents and children.
-Fetal life, adolescence and fertility outcomes. We investigate how factors in early life affect maturation, puberty, later fertility and health.
-Fertility, family structure and transmission of health across generations. We investigate the causes and health consequences of various aspects of fertility such as number of children, number of siblings, childlessness, age at first birth, birth intervals, union formation and dissolution.
-New statistical methods for analysing family and transgenerational data. We develop novel advanced statistical models to analyse genetic data from large-scale genome-wide association studies, integrating SNP and methylation data, and focusing on nuclear families and transgenerational data.
-Covid and its implication on young adults, education, partner formations and fertility. We study the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on health, living conditions, education and fertility.
We use the Norwegian infrastructure for health, including registries, cohorts and biobanks with data from the whole population in our research. The knowledge generated by the Centre is of interest for the general population - especially for family planning, and for researchers, health personnel and decision makers, in Norway and abroad.
Around 60 persons are formally associated with the Centre, including full-time researchers, researchers in part-time positions and administrative personnel. In addition, the Centre collaborates closely with other researchers in Norway and abroad at a number of reputable research institutions.
We have published over 500 papers since the Centre was established in 2017, many in reputable scientific journals.
The Centre’s research activities are organized in several internal and externally funded projects. The projects cut across our research themes and includes projects aiming at studying:
• the health consequences of changes in fertility patterns, partner disruption and sickness in the family
• causes and consequences of reduced fecundity and assisted reproduction technologies (ART), and the genetic and epigenetic factors involved.
• the importance of gestational age for health
• assisted reproduction and perinatal outcomes. We analyse biomarkers to investigate if assisted reproduction has unwanted health consequences for mother and child.
• causes of differences in school performance and the increasing gender difference in educational attainment, as well as the health consequences that follow.
• the social and health consequences of sub-optimal transitions in the education system.
• how mental health is linked with reproduction among men and women and its role in the reproduction of socioeconomic differences across generations.
• how social, biological and psychological forces produce the emerging fertility patterns in young adults, and to what extent the fertility decline and polarization can be attributed to social vs. biomedical factors.
• consequences of the Covid19 pandemic, safety of Covid-19 vaccination in pregnancy, and risks with Covid-19 infection.
• various measures of biological aging and the effect on fertility and health
The Centre has established "The Gro Harlem Brundtland Visiting Scholarship" which is announced on a yearly basis. Nine researchers have received the scholarship.
The Centre organise a symposium each year to involve and engage with our national and international collaborators and to develop new ideas for publications, projects and applications for funding.
In the last few decades we have witnessed marked changes in patterns of fertility and family structure in rich countries. These include increasing age at childbearing, a lower number of children born to each woman or man, greater use of assisted reproductive technology (ART), higher frequency of family disruptions, and increasingly complex family structures. The Centre's ambition is to greatly advance the understanding of the health implications of these changes for the involved adults and children. Elucidation of the complex biological and social causal mechanisms requires broad expertise. Our multidisciplinary research team includes epidemiologists, geneticists, demographers, sociologists and economists - from Norway and abroad.
Our primary objective is to advance the understanding of the factors that influence fertility and elucidate the social and biological pathways through which fertility affects health across the lifespan. For this we make use of the unique Norwegian infrastructure of registries, chorts and biobanks.
Our main research themes are:
- Maternal and paternal age
We investigate the impact of maternal and paternal age at childbirth on subfertility, pregnancy outcomes, and consequences for parental and child health. We also analyse the factors behind the increasing age at childbearing.
- Infertility, subfertility and assisted reproductive technologies
We use genetic, epigenetic and registry data to investigate causes and consequences of infertility and health consequences of subfertility and assisted reproductive technologies in parents and children.
- Fetal life, adolescence and fertility outcomes
We investigate how factors in early life affect maturation, puberty, later fertility and health. Central topics include educational pathways, mental health in social interactions and partner formation.
- Fertility, family structure and transmission of health across generations
We investigate the causes and health consequences of various aspects of fertility such as number of children, number of siblings, childlessness, age at first birth, birth intervals, union formation and dissolution.
- New statistical methods for analysing family and transgenerational data
We develop novel advanced statistical models to analyse genetic data from large-scale genome-wide association studies, integrating SNP and methylation data, and focusing on nuclear families and transgenerational data.
- Covid, vaccination, and its implication on pregnancy, young adults, education, partner formations and fertility
We study the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on health, living conditions, education and fertility.
We use data that are unmatched globally. Information from various Norwegian registers, which include everyone who has lived in the country since 1964 (about 8.5 million persons), are linked using unique personal identification numbers. The register-based life histories for individuals and their close family members include a broad range of demographic, social and health variables. Extensions back to the 1800s through historical databases will be available during the project period. We also utilize the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (370 000 participating mothers, fathers and children), which includes a biobank, information from follow-up questionnaires and clinical examinations, and can be linked to the registries.
