Gender system effects on fertility behaviour of family in sixteen countries: an experiment in joining international demoraphic and health survey data

Type Conference Paper - International Conference in Economics VI
Title Gender system effects on fertility behaviour of family in sixteen countries: an experiment in joining international demoraphic and health survey data
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2002
City Ankara
Country/State Turkey
URL http://content.csbs.utah.edu/~ehrbar/erc2002/pdf/P280.pdf
Abstract
The role distribution of man and women in a society (the gender structure) which is shaped by socio-economic and cultural structure of that society, is one of the important factors affecting fertility behaviour. This gender structure shows differences between developed and developing countries; i.e. each member of these groups have similar charteristics depending on the classification. According to the research resultsin literature, being man and woman leads to diversities in educational and working statuses of sexes in any community, however this variance of sexes can be seen sharply when developed and developing countries are compared. It has been tried to found out how it affects the fertility outcomes in different patterns of it. The aim of this experimental study is to present the effect of gender structure on fertility behaviour of family in developing countries. To achieve this, the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data of 16 developing countries, representing all continents, have been chosen by preferring survey dates and survey models used which show closeness. Collected data of the following 16 countries having time intervals in 1992-1997 have been fulfiling the criteria. These countires are Bangladesh, Bolivia, Brazil, Egypt, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Senegal, Tanzania, Turkey, Uzbekistan, Zimbabwe. It is clear that these countries have different socio-cultural and economic structures. Because of the feature of experimental studies, variables such as cultural factors and religion which might affect the fertility trends would be held constant. Gender system would be analysed by looking at the patterns of socio-economic levels or categories (place of residence, level of education, current working status -labour force participation rate- and occupation type) for men and women (in this study, for women and her husband -DHS data include only education and occupation related variables for both of them-). In the literature, it has been usually assigned to woman (the wife), however, the study results show that the education levels and labour force participation rates of husband are also low in developing countries. The fertility rates of women and their husband are quite higher compared to the data of European Union countries which are given as examples to developed countries in the study. The differences between the fertility rates of hypothetical countries confirm the hypotheses of the study. If the level of education and labour force participation increases, and if education required jobs are carried out, the fertility rates decrease in these countries. According to the study results, the fertility rate in developing countries is determined not only by the socio-economic status (S.E.S) of women but also by the socioeconomic status of men. Husbands also live in the same or similar socio-economic conditions and cultural envirement. These results are also identical in the developed Europian countries; however, women and men have higher S.E.S levels. It has also been observed that socio-economic state of women and husband cannot be seperated. Thus, if empowerment of women in developing countries is required, husbands of these women would also be empowered. In general, if the point is to explain the fertility trends and factors, family, as a result, should not be separeted into two.

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