The graph compares the age of women who had birth to their first child in Australia from 1966 to 2006.
Overall, it is obvious that the highest proportion of Australian females in terms of childbearing to their first child was different in each phase while the amount of such women who were over 40 accounted the smallest percentage throughout the period. It is also noticeable that there was a likelihood of later parenthood over time.
In 1966, the women within the age bracket of 20-24 accounted the highest proportion of giving birth to their first child, over 60%, which then saw a sharp decline, decreasing to just under 40% and 30% in the following decades, in 1986 and 2006. Similarly, there was a dramatic drop in the share of females who were 19 and under, becoming from initially 35% to 10% throughout a forty-year period. Albeit with increasing considerably by 1986, women within the 24-25 age group witnessed a significant decline to just above 40% coming to the year 2006.
The remaining categories of age groups showed a slight increase, with the amount of women who had their first child at the ages of 35-39 amounting to about 8% and with those who were above 40 being almost 1% in 1966, which subsequently reached 30% and 5% respectively. However, the quantity of women aged between 30-34 grew rapidly by approximately 5 times to 50% in 2006, composing the half of overall Australian females who gave their first childbirth in the end of the given period.