Factors that influence children`s anthropometric indices: a focus on female single-parent families

Abstract

In the last decades several alterations have occurred in the dynamics of the organization of families, including changes in size, structure, and composition. Among new family arrangements, the increase in female single-parent families stands out. This structure tends to be in a situation of greater social vulnerability in relation to other arrangements. With this in mind, the scope of this study sought to analyze the relationship between the female single-parent family arrangement and anthropometric measurements of under five-year-old offspring, with data from the 2008-2009 Brazilian household budget survey (POF/IBGE). Two equations for the analysis of anthropometric measurements, with the z-score of "height-for-age" and the z-score of "weight-for-height" as dependent variables, were estimated. The results revealed that, taking other important variables into consideration, such as income, education and domestic characteristics pertaining to the "female single-parent" arrangement, had a positive effect on anthropometric measurements when compared with the "couple with children" arrangement, indicating that in households in which the mother does not have a spouse in residence, children had better long-term health indicators than in households in which the spouse was present.