The Statistical Distribution and Determinants of Mother’s Age at First Birth

Type Journal Article - American Journal of Theoretical and Applied Statistics
Title The Statistical Distribution and Determinants of Mother’s Age at First Birth
Author(s)
Volume 4
Issue 2
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2015
Page numbers 41-52
URL http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.965.4320&rep=rep1&type=pdf
Abstract
The age at which child bearing begins, influences the number of children a woman bears throughout her
reproductive period in the absence of any active fertility control. This study employed both parametric and non-parametric
survival analysis techniques, with a cohort of women within the reproductive age (15-49 years), to determine the statistical
distribution of the age at first birth of a woman from her time of birth and identify the significant prognostic factors
determining the timing of first birth of Ghanaian women. Using data from the Ghana Demographic and Health Survey (GDHS),
the study fitted several parametric Accelerated Failure Time models, from which the best parametric distribution for age at first
birth was selected. The results revealed that, the average age at first birth was about 20 years, with more than 87.4% of the
women having giving birth before they attained 25 years of age. The age at first birth among the Ghanaian women was best
modeled by the log-logistic model. By this model, the age at which a woman had her first birth was determined, at the 10%
significance level, by her Age at first marriage, her Educational level, her Wealth Status and whether or not the women
practiced family planning before their first birth.