| Résumé: | This paper intends to incorporate the study of abortion in Mexico to the generational perspective, and to differences according to types of union. These two dimensions have not been considered by available studies. The data correspond to the 1997 Mexican Demographic Dynamics Survey. One of the most salient findings of this survey refers to the decline of abortions registered among young women (under 30 years of age) of generations born late in the 1940s, and those born twenty years later, during the late 1960s. Differences according to type of union indicate, in turn, that this decline corresponds to married women, who were almost the only ones that practiced abortions, and to estimate abortion’s impact on fertility decline in 1.2 averted births among older generations, and 0.5 for younger generations. The number of averted births among women in free partnership is not over 0.6 in either generation. These differences produce relations of 1 spontaneous abortion out of 6 induced abortions among older married women, and only one out of two among younger women when the proposed differentiation factor is used. Finally, the distribution according to contraceptive method use indicates that young women in free partnership are more effectively protected than married women.
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