Soap Operas as Birth Control

FP Passport reports on a study that relates the decrease in the total fertility rate of Brazilian women over the past few decades to an increasing popularity in soap operas (or novelas as they're known in Brazil). The television shows show women who, for the most part, have zero or only one child. The total fertility rate dropped from 6.3 children in 1960 to 2.3 children in 2000.