Selective Memory around Big Life Decisions; Dr Maximilian W. Müller (briq – Institute on Behavior & Inequality)

Abstract 

Selective memory can lead people to mistake life outcomes as what they always wanted. Using data on past fertility desires from a panel tracking fertility preferences and actual fertility for 3,936 Kenyans from their early twenties to their thirties, I provide monetary incentives to remember and to be reminded of past fertility desires. I find that: (i) 29% of respondents have more children by their thirties than once desired; (ii) despite incentives, especially respondents with excess fertility misremember past desires in the direction of current fertility and do not want to be reminded of them, consistent with motivated memory; (iii) selective memory affects the intergenerational transmission of fertility preferences.

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