The Family Size in the Urban Regions of Wasit Governorate

ABSTRACT The Family is the core of the society upon which every thing depends. Its size has been the subject of interest for a long time. Large size families have often been considered a '' legitimate'' ambition because adding a new baby to the family means more income in an agrarian society, and it also means more man power which signifies mastery, control and prestige added to large size families in rural societies The present paper aims at studying family size in the urban area of Wassit Governorate (specifically the suburban towns). The questionnaire forms were distributed randomly and on the basis of the percentage of family in every town. The sample consisted of 281 families. The paper dealt with family size on the basis of the geographical distribution and other influent geographic, economic and social factors, so as to form a picture of the future of the family size in Wassit . The study concludes that the social factors are the west influential one of the variation of family size at present and that they will continue to be so in the future. It also predicts that family size will tend to be smaller in future. It also found out that males show a tendency for marrying younger few ales with the following , age averages : 26.1, 20.5 years for males and females respectively, and that there is a continual tendency for female marriages below the age of 15 years