Is the KAP-Gap Real?

Type Journal Article - Population and Development Review
Title Is the KAP-Gap Real?
Author(s)
Volume 14
Issue 2
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 1988
Page numbers 225-232
URL http://www.jstor.org/stable/1973570
Abstract
Evidence from four Demographic and Health Surveys suggests that the KAP-gap--defined as currently married women who either want no more children or want to postpone the next birth, who are not intending to use contraception, and who are immediately exposed to the risk of pregnancy--is negligible. The reasons for nonuse among this small minority cover a range of considerations, including lack of contraceptive availability, health concerns, partner disapproval, and cost. The significance of the finding of a very small KAP-gap is not the absence of an unmet need for family planning services, but rather that the difficult problems of motivation, religious and other objections to contraceptive use, fatalism, and health concerns are not the serious problems that may have been presumed and that the basic supply problem of contraceptive availability has been successfully met.

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