Drivers of child marriages for girls: A prospective study in a low-income African setting
| Autor: | Rachel Kidman, Etienne Breton, James Mwera, Andrew Zulu, Jere Behrman, Hans-Peter Kohler |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2024 |
| Předmět: | |
| Zdroj: | Global Public Health, Vol 19, Iss 1 (2024) |
| Druh dokumentu: | article |
| ISSN: | 17441692 1744-1706 1744-1692 |
| DOI: | 10.1080/17441692.2024.2335356 |
| Popis: | ABSTRACTChild marriage has adverse consequences for young girls. Cross-sectional research has highlighted several potential drivers of early marriage. We analyse drivers of child marriage using longitudinal data from rural Malawi, where rates of child marriage are among the highest in the world despite being illegal. Estimates from survival models show that 26% of girls in our sample marry before age 18. Importantly, girls report high decision-making autonomy vis-à-vis the decision to marry. We use multivariate Cox proportional hazard models to explore the role of 1) poverty and economic factors, 2) opportunity or alternatives to marriage, 3) social norms and attitudes, 4) knowledge of the law and 5) girls’ agency. Only three factors are consistently associated with child marriage. First, related to opportunities outside marriage, girls lagging in school at survey baseline have significantly higher rates of child marriage than their counterparts who were at or near grade level. Second, related to social norms, child marriage rates are significantly lower among respondents whose caregivers perceive that members of their community disapprove of child marriage. Third, knowledge of the law has a positive coefficient, a surprising result. These findings are aligned with the growing qualitative literature describing contexts where adolescent girls are more active agents in child marriages. |
| Databáze: | Directory of Open Access Journals |
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