Gender differences in the quality of psychosocial stimulation in rural Bangladesh homes.

Abstract

Little is known about whether and to what extent gender differences affect the stimulation children receive at home, which is crucial to child development. The aim of this study was to document the differences, if any, in the quality of psychosocial stimulation boys and girls receive at home in middle childhood in rural Bangladesh. This study was done as a part of a long-term follow-up study of a cluster randomized controlled trial in 2015. The Middle Childhood-Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (MC-HOME) was adapted and used to measure the quality of home stimulation. Post hoc analysis of the long-term follow-up study was done. Data were analysed using t-test and chi-squared test for continuous and dichotomous variables, respectively. Multiple regression analysis was conducted to control for confounders. A total of 372 child-mother dyads participated in the study. Socio-economic and anthropometric characteristics of the boys and girls did not differ except that more girls had electricity at home (p=.027). Girls were found significantly advantaged over boys in total MC-HOME scores (p=.014) at age around 8years. These findings will play a role for child development policy formulation in Bangladesh. However, though the difference is statistically significant, the strength of relationship is very weak and may not be of functional importance.