School of Social and Political Sciences - Research Publications

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'Generational Bridge' In The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Family Studies

Barbosa Neves, B ; Fernandes, A ; Shehan, C (Wiley, 2016)
P ortugal, Families in

Amaro, F ; Neves, BB ; Shehan, C (Wiley, 2016)

Abstract Portugal is a European country located on the Iberian Peninsula and has been a member of the European Union since 1986. Portugal is a semipresidential constitutional republic, a democratic state based on the rule of law. It has a population of 10.5 million (2012), 48 percent male and 52 percent female. As are most developed countries, in the early twenty‐first century Portugal is experiencing an aging population trend based on low birth, fertility, and mortality rates and high life expectancy rates. Most Portuguese families are nuclear or conjugal, followed by couples without children and single‐person families. The average number of people per family has been decreasing, from 4.2 in 1920 to 2.6 in 2011. After the 1974 revolution, which ended a long‐term dictatorship, the Portuguese Constitution expressed the principle of equal gender rights. Compared to other European countries, Portugal has a high rate of full‐time female employment, in part because low salaries created the need for dual‐earner households.