Women involved in grassroot socio-economic
transformation programme experience a number of maritalrelated
stressors which produce strain symptoms that function
as predictors of their ineffectiveness in local development
initiatives. This finding was made from this study which
examined the existing influence among marital characteristics
symptoms of stress such as child care, domestic chores and
marital crisis or discord. The multi-stage sampling procedure
(involving stratified, simple random and systematic) were
adopted to select married women who participated in the
study. Data were collected using both questionnaires and
interviews, analysed using ANOVA. It was concluded that
women see child care as their own responsibility and do not
perceive the demand of child bearing as a burden; the sharing
of domestic chores among older children and house help make
it easier for women to be effective in grassroot socio-economic
programmes. However, the study indicated that stress arising
from marital discord hinder women effectiveness in being
committed to development related initiatives.