CONTEXTUAL DETERMINANTS OF MARITAL DISSOLUTION AMONG BLACK SOUTH AFRICAN WOMEN: A MULTILEVEL ANALYSIS

Abstract

Marital dissolution and their contextual determinants are concerns to the government and other stakeholders in South Africa. These are so, especially among the Black South African women of childbearing age. The South African Demographic Health Survey (SADHS) 2016 data was used to examine the role of three hierarchical layers of variables (individual, household and community level characteristics) in determining marital dissolution among Black South African women of childbearing age in South Africa. Based on the Social-ecological (SEM) and the Easterlin’s micro-economic models, the chi-squared test and multilevel logistic regression were performed at the bivariate and multivariate levels respectively. The multilevel logistic regressions were performed using the generalised linear and latent mixed model (GLLAMM) to obtain fixed and random effects. Findings suggest that an insignificant proportion of the study sample were ever married. The level of those ever married increased with mother’s age, while the highest proportion of those never married reside in KwaZulu-Natal (88,3%) province. With the exception of language, type of place of residence and place of delivery, all tested factors were found to be significant and/or associated with marital dissolution at different hierarchical model levels (p<0.05). Results of random effect revealed a very small, i.e. insignificant (0.01) variations in their log odds of predicting marital dissolution. The study recommends that these findings be considered in all programme and policy developments around the issue in South Africa.