Women's Educational Attainment Research Articles

Punishing “gender deviants”? Women born in the year of the white horse and college selectivity

Belief in the Chinese zodiac, a cultural belief widely held in East Asian cultures, posits that people are fated to have different traits according to the zodiac animal attached to their birth year. As a white horse is culturally associated with masculine traits, Korean women born in the White Horse year are presumed to be argumentative, headstrong, and born with “too much” Yin energy. In this study, we analyze a nationally representative sample of Korean college graduates to examine whether and how being born in the White Horse year, thereby being chronically exposed to gender stereotype-violating stigma, affects women's higher educational attainment. Our difference-in-differences models show that White Horse women, on average, entered colleges of lower selectivity than did non-White Horse women, whereas no such disadvantage was attached to White Horse men. The results also suggest that, although the negative impact of the White Horse stigma is more salient for socioeconomically disadvantaged White Horse women than for their advantaged counterparts, the difference between the two groups does not reach statistical significance. We discuss the implications of these findings with emphasis on the role of sheer presumptions about gendered expectations in reproducing social disadvantages for women.

Gender, credentials & success: An examination of educational attainment in top management teams

In recent decades, women have made historic gains in educational attainment, now outpacing men in terms of college enrollment and degree completion. Yet, despite the ubiquity of policies and programs aimed at advancing women in work organizations, women's educational gains have not yet translated into greater representation in elite corporate roles. The current study seeks to address this puzzle by analyzing the conditions under which women's educational attainment and credentials enable them to overcome gendered barriers to entry into executive positions. Specifically, we analyze the conditions under which women's educational attainment and credentials facilitate entry into executive roles and provide access to network ties necessary for gaining entrance into male-dominated positions. To answer our research questions we analyze a unique, author-constructed dataset that includes all top executives of the S&P 500 over a 5-year period. We use ordered logistic regression to analyze both the educational attainment and educational networks of executives. Findings suggest that key differences between women and men executives' networks and credentials exist, which contribute to disparities in access to organizational leadership opportunities.

Double burden of malnutrition in 115 Latin American cities: An ecological analysis

AbstractBackgroundUsing harmonized aggregated data on health and socioeconomic environments in Latin American cities (from the Salud Urbana en América Latina (SALURBAL) study), we assessed the association of city‐level contextual factors with the prevalence of the double burden of malnutrition (DBM) in urban settings.MethodsThis ecological study used aggregated survey data from 115 Latin American cities within five countries (Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico and Peru) collected between 2008 and 2016. DBM was defined as the coexistence of stunting in children under 5 years and overweight/obesity among adult women at the city‐level. We ran ordinal logistic regression models to examine macrolevel contextual factors that might explain the city‐level DBM. Independent variables were city‐level socioeconomic development index, women educational attainment and women labor force.ResultsOut of 115 Latin American cities, 19 cities from five countries were experiencing a moderate to high burden of stunting and simultaneously a very high burden of overweight/obesity in adult women. All cities had overweight/obesity prevalence above 40%. A poor social environment, higher levels of women education and greater women labor force at the city level were associated with greater levels of DBM.ConclusionSome Latin American cities are still facing moderate and high DBM, while all cities are experiencing an alarming high burden of overweight/obesity. Social macro‐level factors such as poor social environment, high women education and high women labor force were associated with the coexistence of stunting in children and overweight/obesity in adult women.

Brief of Amici Curiae economists in support of respondents in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.

A pillar of Mississippi's argument in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health was that there is no evidence of "societal reliance" on abortion, meaning no reason to believe that access to abortion impacts the ability of women to participate in the economic and social life of the nation. Led by economist Caitlin Myers and attorney Anjali Srinivasan, more than 150 economists filed an amicus brief seeking to assist the Court in understanding that this assertion is erroneous. The economists describe developments in causal inference methodologies over the last three decades, and the ways in which these tools have been used to isolate the measure of the effects of abortion legalization in the 1970s and of abortion policies and access over the ensuing decades. The economists argue that there is a substantial body of well-developed and credible research that shows that abortion access has had and continues to have a significant effect on birth rates as well as broad downstream social and economic effects, including on women's educational attainment and job opportunities. What follows is a reprint of this brief.

The Intergenerational Transmission of Health Disadvantage: Can Education Disrupt It?

In low-income countries, intergenerational processes can culminate in the replication of extreme forms of health disadvantage between mothers and adult daughters, including experiencing a young child's death. The preventable nature of most child deaths raises questions of whether social resources can protect women from enduring this adversity like their mothers. This study examined whether education-widely touted as a vehicle for social mobility in resource-poor countries-disrupts the intergenerational cycle of maternal bereavement. We estimated multilevel discrete-time survival models of women's hazard of child loss using Demographic and Health Survey Program data (N = 195,744 women in 345 subnational regions in 32 African countries). Women's educational attainment minimizes the salience of their mothers' bereavement history for their own probability of child loss; however, mothers' background becomes irrelevant only among women with ≥10 years of schooling. Education's neutralizing influence is most prominent in the highest mortality-burdened communities.

SEXISM IN FLANNERY O'CONNOR'S “WISE BLOOD”

This research paper aims to explore the theme of sexism, particularly within Flannery O'Connor's novel “Wise Blood”. Historically, societies have upheld a patriarchal structure where men were considered the standard while women were viewed as exceptions. For instance, Aristotle famously asserted that women were inferior to men but superior to slaves, elevating men as the epitome of human perfection. Despite progress over time, deep-seated prejudices against women have persisted, manifesting in various forms such as sexual harassment and domestic violence. Consequently, sexism permeates multiple aspects of life, not confined to any single domain. In recent years, there has been a notable increase in women's educational attainment, with more females attending college and graduating with degrees in traditionally male-dominated fields like the sciences. However, despite these advancements, disparities persist, with fewer women pursuing careers in areas such as science and academia. Numerous factors contribute to perpetuating sexism, including societal expectations surrounding motherhood and family commitments, early socialization patterns that shape interactions between genders, institutional barriers within certain fields, and even conjectures rooted in biological differences. This paper endeavors to examine these multifaceted aspects of sexism in both literature and contemporary society.<p> </p><p><strong> Article visualizations:</strong></p><p><img src="/-counters-/soc/0787/a.php" alt="Hit counter" /></p>

Two-worker Households, Decentralized Employment, and Residential Segregation

AbstractThe last century was marked by a remarkable improvement in the economic position of women, as reflected in higher labor force participation and wages. This paper extends the Hybrid Tiebout models of residential choice to allow for two-worker households. Our model incorporates both residential choice and labor market choices of households simultaneously and, thus, gives us a unique opportunity to study the impact of changes in the labor market conditions for workers on residential segregation. We develop a general equilibrium model of residential choice with decentralized workplaces in which households face a trade-off among accessibility, space and a public good (education). Education is financed through property taxes, which are determined by majority voting. The quality of education is determined by the spending and the peer group effects. The model is interesting in the sense that (i) households consider the work locations of both male and female working members of the household while making residential choice decisions; (ii) the presence of decentralized workplaces offers an alternative job location to workers; and (iii) the endogenous labor supply decisions for workers. We find that the increase in educational attainment for women and the changes in wages for men and women have had a substantial impact on the spatial distribution of households across metropolitan areas and hence, segregation by income.

The impact of female education on fertility: evidence from Malawi Universal Primary Education program

Abstract This paper examines the impact of female education on fertility outcomes by using the Universal Primary Education (UPE) program in Malawi as a natural experiment. The finding indicates that the UPE policy improves rural women's educational attainment by 0.42 years and an additional year of female education decreases women's number of children ever born and the number of living children by 0.39 and 0.34, respectively. An analysis of potential mechanisms suggests that the decreased fertility rates are likely driven by the reduction in women's fertility preferences, the postponement of marriage, and the delay of motherhood. Contrarily, the study finds no evidence that increased female education affects women's labor force participation and the use of modern contraception.

BAYESIAN PROJECTIONS OF TOTAL FERTILITY RATE CONDITIONAL ON THE UNITED NATIONS SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS.

Women's educational attainment and contraceptive prevalence are two mechanisms identified as having an accelerating effect on fertility decline and that can be directly impacted by policy. Quantifying the potential accelerating effect of education and family planning policies on fertility decline in a probabilistic way is of interest to policymakers, particularly in high-fertility countries. We propose a conditional Bayesian hierarchical model for projecting fertility given education and family planning policy interventions. To illustrate the effect policy changes could have on future fertility, we create probabilistic projections of fertility that condition on scenarios such as achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for universal secondary education and universal access to family planning by 2030.

The Impact of Education on Fertility During the Chinese Reform Era (1980–2018): Changes Across Birth Cohorts and Interaction with Fertility Policies

We examined the influence of education on fertility decisions in contemporary China, drawing upon theoretical insights that emphasise the role of social institutions, gender relations, and life course dynamics in shaping family behaviour. This led us to propose a set of hypotheses that explain the differential effect of education on each parity. We used information on female cohorts born between 1960 and 1989, coming from the China Family Panel Studies for 2010–2018. We applied event history models with both independent and simultaneous equations models to account for selection and endogeneity effects. The results point to a substantial contribution of the increased educational attainment in the population in the fertility decline and current low levels of fertility, beyond the role of fertility policies. Consistent with our hypotheses, the results show that woman’s educational attainment has a strong negative effect on the hazard of bearing a second or third child. Male partner’s educational attainment also has a negative effect on the hazard of transition to a second or third birth, yet with a weaker intensity. We also found that the negative effect of education on second birth rates significantly declines across birth cohorts. The results show little educational differentials in the probability of bearing a first child, while the better educated postpone first births. Moreover, the effect of fertility policies, measured at the individual level, gradually increases with the level of education.

Women's status, empowerment, and utilization of skilled delivery services in Papua New Guinea: an empirical analysis based on structural equation modeling.

Skilled birth attendants (SBA) facilitate identifying and overcoming labor problems and saving lives. With one of the highest maternal death rates in the Asia-Pacific area, SBA utilization during childbirth among Papua New Guinea (PNG) women remains low. Women's status and empowerment are important factors in maternal and child health services and critical to maternal and child health development. This study is intended to apply structural equation modeling based on data from the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) to evaluate the causal relationship between women's status, empowerment, and SBA utilization in PNG and the mechanisms of their influence. This study employed data from the 2016-2018 Papua New Guinea Demographic Health Survey (PNG DHS), which recruited 18,175 women aged 15-49 years. A multi-stage sample and a structured questionnaire were used to collect information on maternal health, women's empowerment, and related topics. STATA 17.0 was used to describe the data, while MPLUS 8.2 was employed for structural equation modeling and pathway analysis. The two empowerment dimensions of household decision-making (standardized path coefficient, β = 0.049, p < 0.05) and access to health services (β = 0.069, p < 0.01) were positively associated with SBA utilization, while the association between attitudes toward partner violence and SBA utilization was not statistically significant. In addition, mediation analysis revealed that education indirectly influenced SBA utilization through access to health services (β = 0.011, 95% CI: 0.002, 0.022). The findings confirmed the direct and indirect effects of women's status and empowerment on SBA utilization in PNG. Therefore, a call for further evidence-based interventions in PNG and possibly Pacific Small Island Developing States (PSIDS) is needed to improve women's educational attainment, household decision-making, and access to health services to enhance maternal and newborn health and well-being.

Determinants of the First Birth Interval Among Women in India.

The first-birth interval after a marriage indicates the reproduction behavior of women and influences the population's birth rates and size. The present study assesses predictors of the interval between marriage and first childbirth in India. The study employed the Cox proportional hazard model and Kaplan Meier Survival plot based on the data collected from 79,787 ever-married women in the 15-49 age group from the National Family Health Survey 2019-2021. The median age of marriage to the first birth interval was 23 months in India. The older marriage cohort had longer birth intervals than the younger. The hazard ratios (HR) showed that the risk of first birth after marriage was much higher among women with higher education (HR= 2.05, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.98-2.11) than women without education. Women in urban areas (HR=1.22, 95% CI = 1.20-1.25) had a higher risk of first birth after marriage earlier than women from rural areas. Women from North-east (HR=1.14, 95% CI=1.10-1.18) and South (HR=1.15, 95% CI=1.12-1.19) had a higher risk of having their first birth earlier after marriage than women in the North region. The women who married within 18-24 years of age had a 69 percent higher likelihood of first birth interval than those women who were married below the age of 18. The risk of first birth after marriage increased as women delayed marriage up to age 25 years and more (HR=3.18, 95% CI=3.02-3.35) than others. The timing of first birth was associated with the age at the first marital union, women's educational attainment, place of residence, region, economic status, exposure to mass media, contraception use, and history of pregnancy termination.

Unraveling the Intersection of Socio-Economic Dynamics and Family Planning Accessibility: Insights from Women of Reproductive Age in Kween District, Eastern Uganda

The provision and utilization of Family Planning (FP) services play a pivotal role in not only safeguarding women's health but also significantly enhancing the overall well-being of their partners, children, and the wider societal fabric. Studies have estimated that optimizing FP services could potentially save 32% of maternal lives and 10% of child lives. In light of these critical implications, this research delves into the multifaceted factors hindering women's access to Family Planning Services within the precincts of the Kween district. Employing a cross-sectional descriptive study design, this investigation focuses on women aged between 18-49 years. Data collection involved survey questionnaires administered to a strategically sampled group of 40 women. The quantitative data underwent meticulous analysis utilizing SPSS version 20, while qualitative data was subjected to content and thematic analysis, presenting findings in a verbatim format. The study revealed that while 47.5% of women were utilizing modern FP methods, encompassing pills, implants, and injectables, there existed a notable unmet contraceptive need of 25%, coupled with a 22.5% contraceptive discontinuation rate. The primary deterrent to accessing modern FP methods stemmed from acceptability issues entrenched in prevailing myths, notably the erroneous beliefs associating Family Planning with infertility and the culturally unfavorable birth of twins. Moreover, the discontinuation of modern FP methods predominantly stemmed from reported side effects such as excessive bleeding, backaches, and headaches. Additionally, the research underscored a correlation between the utilization of modern FP methods, women's educational attainment, and demographic factors like the number of living male children and participation in polygamous marriages. Intriguingly, religious affiliations had a limited impact on FP method utilization, as women demonstrated a tendency to contravene religious doctrines to access FP services despite religious opposition. This study illuminates critical barriers obstructing women's access to and sustained use of modern FP methods in the Kween district, emphasizing the urgency for tailored interventions addressing socio-cultural misconceptions, side-effect management, and demographic sensitivities to foster more inclusive and effective FP service delivery in similar contexts. Keywords: Family Planning, Contraceptives, Injectables, Implants.

Do women's empowerment and self-expression values change adolescents' gendered occupational expectations? Longitudinal evidence against the gender-equality paradox from 26 European countries.

Despite the increases in women's educational attainment in recent decades, female labor market participation and labor market returns are still lower than those of their male counterparts. Among the main factors explaining this persistence of economic inequality is the persistently gendered nature of occupational expectations, which results in gender segregation of labor. In this paper, we describe how gender-specific adolescents' occupational expectations change over time (2006-2018) and how women's empowerment and cultural norms might influence gender-specific occupational expectations. Against the backdrop of the research on the gender-equality paradox and from a comparative perspective, we focus on national and institutional characteristics to investigate how individual and national factors explain gendered occupational expectations. We answer our research questions by applying a two-step multilevel model with fixed effects. For this, we used PISA data and merged them with state-level information from 26 European countries. We add to existing research by making three contributions. First, we describe the changes in occupational expectations over time within European countries by looking at the gender composition of the desired occupation and distinguishing three categories (gender-typical, gender-balanced, and gender-atypical). Second, we investigate the relationship between national characteristics and the evolution of gendered occupational expectations separately by gender to reveal gender-specific mechanisms. Third, by using data from two-time points, we explore which national-level changes lead to changes in students' occupational expectations. Our first descriptive results show that the patterns of how students' occupational expectations change over time differ remarkably between countries. In 2018 in some countries, students' occupational expectations became more segregated while in others the number of students with gender-balanced or gender-atypical expectations increased. Our fixed effects models show that women's empowerment and self-expression value explained variance over time. For example, women's empowerment measured via an increase in women's employment and participation in parliament led to less gender-typical occupational expectations among girls and boys. Similarly, a rise in self-expression values led to less gender-typical occupational expectations, again for both boys and girls. Remarkably, our results do not verify the gender-equality paradox for occupational expectations, as is the case in previous cross-sectional analyses.

Later, Fewer, None? Recent Trends in Cohort Fertility in South Korea

South Korea and other developed regions in East Asia have become forerunners of prolonged lowest-low fertility. South Korea's total fertility rate has been below 1.3 for two decades, the longest duration among OECD countries. Using vital statistics and census data, I study recent trends in the country's cohort fertility covering women born before the 1960s to those born in the 1980s. Analyzing outcomes at both the intensive margin of fertility (i.e., timing and number of children) and the extensive margin of family formation (i.e., marriage and childlessness), I document three novel patterns. First, the driver of low fertility has evolved across birth cohorts, from married women having later and fewer childbirths, to fewer women getting married, and finally to fewer women having children even if married. Second, a decomposition analysis of marriage and fertility changes indicates that the marriage and fertility decline was driven by changes within educational groups rather than by changes in women's educational composition. Third, the relationship between women's educational attainment and marriage or fertility was negative for the 1960s cohort, but an inverted U-shaped education gradient emerged beginning with the 1970s cohort.

Cultural collectivism, intimate partner violence, and women's mental health: An analysis of data from 151 countries.

Culture, defined as the distinctive, learned beliefs and patterns of behavior that are particular to a given group or community, is a key determinant of mental health. The cultural dimension of individualism-collectivism, which measures the extent to which a given society accords importance to individuals as opposed to larger groups, has been associated with cross-national variations in mental health outcomes such as depression and suicide. However, this cultural dimension is also associated with variations in the frequency of intimate partner violence (IPV), which has a significant and sustained adverse impact on women's mental health. This study examines the relationships between individualism-collectivism, the frequency of IPV, and rates of depression and suicide in women, based on data from 151 countries. In this data set, IPV was significantly associated with age-standardized rates of depression and suicide in women, even after adjusting for demographic variables. Cultural collectivism was positively correlated with IPV, but this relationship was significantly influenced by national income and women's educational attainment. In multivariate analyses, IPV, but not cultural collectivism, remained significantly associated with depression in women. These results highlight the importance of screening for and addressing IPV in women seeking mental health care, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where cultural and economic factors may both increase the risk of IPV and delay or impede its reporting.

Associations of Education and Income with Secondhand Smoke Exposure Among Non-smoking Pregnant Women in Japan: The Tohoku Medical Megabank Project Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study.

There is accumulating evidence that lower socioeconomic groups are more exposed to secondhand smoke (SHS) than higher ones in the general population. The objective of the study was to examine the associations of education and income with SHS exposure among non-smoking pregnant women in Japan. We analyzed data from 11,615 non-smoking pregnant women in Japan who participated in the Tohoku Medical Megabank Project Birth and Three-Generation Cohort Study from 2013 to 2017. SHS exposure was defined as indoor exposure to someone else's cigarette smoke ≥ 1day/week during pregnancy. Multiple logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine whether pregnant women's educational attainment or equivalent household income was associated with SHS exposure, adjusting for covariates. Stratified analyses by work status were also conducted. The prevalence of SHS exposure during pregnancy was 32.6%; 27.6% among non-working women and 35.8% among working women. Lower educational attainment was associated with an increased risk of SHS exposure; the odds ratio of high school education or lower compared with university education or higher was 1.87 (95% confidence interval, 1.66-2.10). Lower equivalent household income was associated with an increased risk of SHS exposure; the odds ratio of the lowest compared with the highest level of income was 1.53 (95% confidence interval, 1.35-1.74). These associations did not differ between non-working women and working women. Associations of education and income with SHS exposure imply that educational interventions and financial incentives are needed for pregnant women and their household smokers.

Decomposing trends in educational homogamy and heterogamy – The case of Ireland

Employing Irish Census microdata, we analyze trends in educational homogamy and heterogamy between 1991 and 2016 and examine how they can be explained by concurrent trends in three theoretically relevant socio-demographic components – (a) educational attainment, (b) the educational gradient in marriage, and (c) educational assortative mating (i.e., non-random matching). Our study proposes a novel counterfactual decomposition method to estimate the contribution of each component to changing sorting outcomes in marriages. Findings indicate rising educational homogamy, an increase in non-traditional unions in which women partner ‘down’ in education, and a decline in traditional unions. Decomposition results suggest that these trends are predominantly attributable to changes in women's and men's educational attainment. Furthermore, changes in the educational gradient in marrying contributed to rising homogamy and the decline in traditional unions, a fact largely overlooked in previous research. Although assortative mating has also undergone changes, they barely contribute to trends in sorting outcomes.

Individualism and women's economic rights

Individualism is associated with an emphasis on personal liberty and self-determination, values that reduce support for patriarchal norms and increase gender equality. Here, we investigate whether individualism affects women's economics rights, a key institutional determinant of the economic opportunities available to women. We provide evidence of an economically and statistically significant association between individualism and the de facto level of women's economic rights. This result is robust to a variety of controls, including per capita income, women's educational attainment, oil production, historical determinants of patriarchal culture, and the quality of legal and political institutions. In addition, we present evidence that this association is causal, drawing on instruments motivated by roles of climate and disease in cultural evolution. Finally, we show that individualism's influence on women's economic rights is magnified in democratic and common law countries, suggesting that democracies and common law systems channel cultural preferences into legal outcomes.

Unwanted daughters: the unintended consequences of a ban on sex-selective abortions on the educational attainment of women

We study whether legal restrictions on prenatal discrimination against females leads to a shift by parents towards postnatal discrimination, focusing on the impact on educational attainment. We exploit the differentially timed introduction of a ban on sex-selective abortions across states in India. We find that a legal restriction on abortions led to an increase in the number of females born, as well as a widening in the gender gap in educational attainment. Females born in states affected by the ban are 2.3, 3.5, and 3.2 percentage points less likely to complete grade 10, complete grade 12, and enter university, respectively, relative to males. These effects are concentrated among non-wealthy households that lacked the resources to evade the ban. Investigating mechanisms, we find that the relative reduction in investments in female education was not driven by family size but because surviving females became relatively unwanted, whereas surviving males became relatively more valued, leading to an increasing concentration of household resources on them. Discrimination is amplified among higher-order births and among females with relatively few sisters. Finally, these negative effects exist despite the existence of a marriage market channel through which parents increase investments in their daughters’ education to increase the probability that they make a high-quality match. This suggests that policymakers need to address the unintended welfare consequences of interventions aimed at promoting gender equity.