Family Planning Behavior Research Articles

Household Fertility Decisions in West Africa: A Comparison of Male and Female Survey Results

This study compares the responses of matched husbands and wives in monogamous and polygynous unions, in the Yoruba village of Bolorunduro in Ondo State, Nigeria, with respect to a variety of family planning and fertility-related attitudes and behaviors. The results suggest that, although the husband and wife responses on the family planning and achieved fertility items were generally similar, responses relating to prospective fertility intentions were very different between husbands and wives. The results are consistent with the notion that fertility intention orientations in this particular culture operate essentially on an individual and not a family level. Women, whether in monogamous or polygynous unions, have fertility preferences that, while normatively bound, are clearly individual preferences and not necessarily related to their husbands' desires.

Further Studies on Family Formation Patterns and Health

Further Studies on Family Formation Patterns and Health is a continuation of the first volume that reported studies in India, Iran, Lebanon, the Philippines, and Turkey. The present volume carries the study to Columbia, Egypt, Pakistan, and the Syrian Arab Republic. Family health is commonly taken to be synonymous with the health of the mother and the younger child, whereas this study investigates family formation as a whole. The collaborating centers considered the questions of family formation as it relates to social characteristics, pregnancy outcome, childhood mortality, child development, maternal health, loss of a child, and birth control, including both attitudes toward and actual practice behavior. The design of the study was to examine the health risks associated with certain patterns of family formation, including the number and spacing of pregnancies, maternal age, birth order, and family size. In addition, the social and cultural correlates of fertility and family-planning behavior

The Transition in Korean Family Planning Behavior, 1935-1976: A Retrospective Cohort Analysis

This study traces the diffusion of family planning behavior-the use of abortion, contraception, and/or sterilization-in Korea between 1935 and 1976. Within- and cross-cohort examinations were made of the levels of ever-use of family planning, method of initiation of family planning, and patterns of family planning behavior. Ever-use of any of the three modes was very low for all cohorts prior to the introduction of the National Family Planning Program in 1962; afterwards, family planning diffused at a rapid rate. A major determinant of ever-use levels attained by cohorts married before 1962 was the length of time between the introduction of the program and menopause.

Sexual role relationships, conjugal emotional support and family planning behaviour

SummaryIn a study of patients attending a family planning clinic, aspects of the conjugal sexual relationship were examined. Some wives perceived the relationship as one in which they and their husband were equally likely to initiate sexual discussion and to decide when to have intercourse, and received equal pleasure from sex; empathy and communication were features of the relationship and sexual needs were balanced. Others saw their husbands as dominating sexual discussion, to be the initiators of intercourse and to obtain the greatest pleasure from coitus; their husbands appeared to lack empathy, did not like to talk about menstruation and were seen as having greater sexual needs than the wife. The former type of balanced sexual relationship exhibiting mutuality was associated with good attendance at the family planning clinic whilst the isolated behaviour perceived in a husband-orientated sexual relationship was associated with poor attendance

Rural Electrification and Fertility Change in the Southern Philippines

In 1971 a large-scale electrification project was implemented in a rural area in the southern Philippines. Approximately 1 year later the area experienced a rapid decline in marital fertility which lowered the birth rate from 46-30 within 4 years. The influence that the provision of electricity (in the presence of other developmental efforts and of the availability of modern family planning services) had on generating fertility-reducing social and economic change is explored. Following a detailed description of the area (the Misamis Oriental Province) including social and economic characteristics and recent change the fertility trends and family planning behavior of residents are discussed. Electricity is seen to have a community-level impact on the nonagricultural and agricultural economy on health and environmental sanitation and on education and social activities as well as a household-level impact by changing income patterns of female employment savings and investments and perceived costs and benefits of children. The influences of rural development combined with the availability of fertility control measures has changed contraceptive behavior and thus led to a lowered birth rate.

An extended expectancy-value approach to contraceptive alternatives

The expectancy value-normative influence model is based on the premise that the overall value to an individual of using an object (e.g. a specific contraceptive method) is a function of the degree to which its use is perceived to result in favorable consequences and the avoidance of unfavorable ones. Components of the Fishbein Extended Model are identified and discussed. The first the attitudinal component (Aact) made up of overt behavior (B) and behavioral intent (BI) incorporates 1) the individuals strength of belief connecting each salient contraceptive attribute and consequence of use to an individuals evaluation of each of the salient attributes. This component also includes the expectancy (beliefs regarding contraceptive characteristics) and the value (whether these characteristics and their results will be satisfactory or unsatisfactory). Normative beliefs (NBi) and motivation to comply (MCi) round out the model structure. This model was applied in a pilot study of contraceptive alternatives. The 23 attitude items used in the questionnaire were derived from in-depth interviews with 8 discussion groups composed of men and women of different backgrounds and were pretested on 117 respondents. The sample consisted of 58 individuals (21 males 37 females) ages 18 or older. Multiple correlations varied from R = .46 (pill males) to .88 (diaphragm females) with a median R of .57 and tended to be higher for females perhaps reflecting their greater involvement in the contraception decision-making process. The highest multiple Rs were obtained for lesser used methods such as the diaphragm and foam. Female intentions for the couple to use condoms were dominated by the normative (perceptions regarding the actions we think important others believe should be taken) rather than attitudinal (beliefs regarding the characteristics associated with the consequences of a method) component as were male intentions to have the couple use oral contraception. Attitudinal influences predominated for the diaphragm while IUD intentions were largely under normative control and those for foam under joint influence. Highly significant attitudinal correlations were found for questionnaire items that the user groups considered relevant for their evaluations of the method. While these findings should be considered tentative given the small and restrictive sample they illustrate the potential of this theoretical approach for understanding family planning and population behavior.

The Health Belief Model as a Conceptual Framework for Explaining Contraceptive Compliance

The problem of compliance in family planning is discussed in relation to the lack of theoretical and conceptual clarity in research, which has produced contradictory, and often inconsistent findings. Current research has contributed little to explaining the phenomenon of compliance and to directing further research. The Health Belief Model, which has been demonstrated to have application in the areas of preventive health behavior and compliance with medical regimens, is offered as a potentially useful conceptual framework for family planning research. The generalization of the Health Belief Model to family planning behavior is seen as an out-growth of the theoretical strength of the Model and the similarities between family planning and other health behavior.

Demographic and socio-economic variations in health and family planning behavior in urban Pakistan

In a sample of married women in the reproductive ages in Lahore, Pakistan systematic variations by demographic variables are found for use of modern contraceptive methods and use of maternal-child health services varies by socio-economic status. A significant group of women report their intention to use modern obstetrical services for future deliveries but a majority intend to continue use of the traditional untrained midwife.

Alienation antecedents of unwanted fertility: a longitudinal study.

Women high in alienation may in a sense be victimized by a higher probability of having unwanted pregnancies than women low in alienation. From this perspective high alienation may be concomitant with a sense of (at most) going through the motions of family planning with a rather low confidence that ones ability will suffice to achieve the desired goal and a tendency therefore not to be particularly involved in the mechanisms of family planning. High alienation in its separate and combined aspects may constitute a highly salient social psychological obstacle of the probability of acting with confidence in the emotionally charged area of fertility and family planning behavior. The major control relevant implication is that ineffective family planning may derive not only from lack of knowledge or of access to methods but also from the social psychological inaccessibility of knowledge generating a dominance of emotional over rational elements in the decision making process. (authors)

The Role of Interspousal Communication in Adoption of Family Planning Methods: A Couple Approach

Of the several approaches designed to study the adoption of family plann¬ing methods one approach emphasizes the dynamics related to the husband-wife dyad, especially communication and interaction between the spouses as related to family planning behaviour. Interspousal communication has been shown to be an important variable in family planning behaviour in relatively underdeveloped as well as developed societies. Authors of the well-known Puerto Rican family study attributed a great deal of importance to interspousal communication as an explanatory factor in family planning and fertility behaviour [5 and 6]. Hill [6] described communi¬cation as the "hub" variable and concluded that the principal factors in family planning adoption were emphasis on planning, communication between spouses and the ability to come to a joint decision. Using data from a survey in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), Green [3] showed that contraceptive use was correlated directly with interspousal com¬munication. Among non-user couples, 75 % of the husbands and 69 % of the wives said they had learned nothing from their spouses, compared with only 45% and 17% of user husbands and wives saying they had learned nothing from each other. Green feels that one of the major barriers to diffusion of action-associated knowledge about family planning is the lack of communication between spouses.

Mental Health and Family Planning

In the past professionals in mental health and in family planning have gone their separate ways; but this is beginning to change. A cooperative group on transnational research in family planning has been organized to bring psychosocial demographic and public health apsects of family planning and fertility-related behavior into closer perspective. Mental health professionals demographers and public health-oriented physicians from Central and Eastern Europe Western Europe and the United States met in Budapest in 1969 and in Geneva in 1970 to discuss certain projects; as a result of the meetings several joint research studies were initiated. In 1971 a scientific group on "Mental Health and Family Planning" will be convened by the World Health Organization.