Scientists Predict How Families Will Change by 2095—’Seismic Shifts’

The size of the average family may shrink significantly in the coming decades, scientists have forecast.

An individual is predicted to have 35 percent fewer relatives by 2095, with the number of younger relatives like cousins, nieces, nephews and grandchildren falling, according to a new study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

While the average 65-year-old woman in 1950 had an average of 41 relatives still alive, a woman of the same age will only have 25 by 2095, most of whom will be older relatives like great-grandparents and grandparents.

“These seismic shifts in family structure will bring about important societal challenges that policymakers in the global North and South should consider,” Diego Alburez-Gutierrez, paper co-author and head of the Independent Research Group on Kinship Inequalities at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR), said in a statement.

To arrive at these predictions, the researchers—hailing from the MPIDR in Germany, the University of Buenos Aires and the University of Amsterdam—compiled data on family sizes from around the world using historical and projected data from the 2022 revision of the United Nation’s World Population Prospects, and analyzed how those families were changing.

“We asked ourselves how demographic change will affect the ‘endowment’ of kinship in the future,” Alburez-Gutierrez explained. “What was the size, structure, and age distribution of families in the past, and how will they evolve in the future?”

“We use mathematical models to represent the relationship between a person, their ancestors, and their descendants in a given time period. The model provides average age and sex distributions for different types of kinship for each calendar year,” said Alburez-Gutierrez.

The researchers defined relatives as living parents, children, uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews, siblings, cousins, grandchildren, great-grandparents, grandparents, and great-grandchildren. They found that the decline in family size may affect some areas of the world more than others.

“We expect the overall size of families to decline permanently in all regions of the world. We expect the largest declines in South America and the Caribbean,” said Alburez-Gutierrez.

The average 65-year-old South American women had 56 relatives in 1950, a number that is expected to drop to 18.3 by 2095. In North America and Europe, where the average 65-year-old woman had 25 relatives in 1950, she can expect to have 15.9 relatives in 2095. Many of these remaining relatives are expected to be older rather than younger.

An aging population is expected to have a major impact on the availability of care for the elderly, especially those with fewer younger relatives.

“Our findings confirm that the availability of kinship resources is declining worldwide. As the age gap between individuals and their relatives widens, people will have family networks that are not just smaller, but also older,” Alburez-Gutierrez said.

“Consider the case of grandparents and great-grandparents, who are expected to be in greater supply in the future. While this could theoretically help ease the burden of childcare for parents, these (great-)grandparents may actually need care themselves,” he said.

The study therefore highlights the burgeoning need for social support for the elderly, instead of relying on family, which a vast number of people do not yet have access to. In a future where family may not be enough, ways to ensure the older population is cared for are needed, the researchers stressed.

“Our findings support the calls for more investment in childcare and old-age care to alleviate the burden of individuals aging with fewer kinship resources to rely on,” the authors wrote in the paper.

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