Studies have suggested that over recent decades, UK women have postponed motherhood largely because they want to go onto college or university to gain qualifications or fulfil educational aspirations before starting a family. New research from the University of Oxford in the UK and the Universities of Groningen and Wageningen in the Netherlands sheds new light on this theory, however, showing that the role of education is much smaller in delaying motherhood than previously believed. The researchers found that in the UK, a woman’s family background was the major factor rather than education. The full findings are published in the journal, Demography.