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Full-Text Articles in Medicine and Health Sciences
Completing The Demographic Transition, John Bongaarts, Rodolfo A. Bulatao
Completing The Demographic Transition, John Bongaarts, Rodolfo A. Bulatao
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Despite ongoing declines in fertility in many countries, the population of the world is experiencing a period of rapid expansion, and its size is expected to exceed 10 billion by the end of the demographic transition. Three causes of this growth are identified and quantified: 1) fertility above the replacement level of two surviving children per woman, 2) continuing declines in mortality, and 3) population momentum resulting from a young age structure. A set of simple analytic expressions is proposed for estimating these factors from standard demographic indicators. Population momentum is shown to be the main cause of future growth …
Measuring Living Standards With Proxy Variables, Mark R. Montgomery, Michele Gragnolati, Kathleen A. Burke, Edmundo Paredes
Measuring Living Standards With Proxy Variables, Mark R. Montgomery, Michele Gragnolati, Kathleen A. Burke, Edmundo Paredes
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Very few demographic surveys in developing countries gather information on household income or consumption expenditure, despite the theoretical importance of these measures. Consequently, researchers have been forced to rely on ad hoc collections of proxy measures for living standards, and the properties of these proxies have not been systematically analyzed. In this research, we ask what hypotheses can be tested using proxy variables, and evaluate the performance of proxy measures in relation to consumption expenditures per adult, our preferred measure of living standards. We find that the proxy variables commonly employed in demographic research are very weak predictors of consumption …
Fertility Preferences And Contraceptive Change In Developing Countries, Bamikale J. Feyisetan, John B. Casterline
Fertility Preferences And Contraceptive Change In Developing Countries, Bamikale J. Feyisetan, John B. Casterline
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Fertility has declined substantially in developing countries in the period since 1960, primarily as the result of increases in contraceptive prevalence. Little dispute is found on this point, but considerable debate has arisen about the causes of the increase in contraceptive prevalence. One unresolved issue is the causal contribution of changes in fertility desires. The sources of increase in contraceptive prevalence are analyzed in 22 countries in Latin America, Asia, and Africa in the period from the 1970s to the 1990s, using World Fertility Surveys and Demographic and Health Surveys data. Through regression decomposition, change in prevalence is attributed to …
The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation [Arabic], Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark
The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation [Arabic], Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Female circumcision is widespread in Egypt. Research suggests that the practice persists because of a belief that circumcision will moderate female sexuality, that it will assure a girl’s marriageability, and that it is sanctioned by Islam. Using data from a nationally representative survey of adolescents, this paper investigates the prevalence and social correlates of circumcision among girls aged 10-19, the circumstances surrounding the procedure, and the attitudes of adolescents towards it. While the vast majority of adolescents are circumcised, a life table analysis indicates that girls today are at least 10 percentage points less likely to undergo female circumcision than …
The Fertility Impact Of Changes In The Timing Of Childbearing In The Developing World, John Bongaarts
The Fertility Impact Of Changes In The Timing Of Childbearing In The Developing World, John Bongaarts
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
This study examines the role of tempo effects in the fertility declines of developing countries. These effects temporarily inflate the total fertility rate (relative to the actual fertility of cohorts of women) during periods when the age at childbearing declines and they deflate it when childbearing is postponed. An analysis of data from the World Fertility Surveys and the Demographic and Health Surveys demonstrates that fertility trends observed in many developing countries are likely to be distorted by changes in the timing of childbearing. In most countries women are delaying childbearing, which implies that observed fertility is lower than it …
Premarital Sex And School Dropout In Kenya: Can Schools Make A Difference?, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Annabel Erulkar
Premarital Sex And School Dropout In Kenya: Can Schools Make A Difference?, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Annabel Erulkar
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Although an overall decline has occurred in adolescent fertility in Kenya, the proportion of births to teenagers that takes place prior to marriage is rising. At the same time that premarital sex and childbearing have increased, educational participation has expanded considerably, especially for girls. Using data from nearly 600 adolescents aged 12-19 in combination with data collected from 33 primary schools that the adolescents attended, this paper explores whether certain aspects of the school environment affect the likelihood of early and unprotected sex among adolescent girls and boys in three districts of Kenya. Because of the concern with “schoolgirl pregnancy” …
Urban Growth In Developing Countries: A Review Of Projections And Predictions, Martin Brockerhoff
Urban Growth In Developing Countries: A Review Of Projections And Predictions, Martin Brockerhoff
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Comparison of the United Nations’ earliest and most recent projections to the year 2000 suggests that urban and city growth in developing regions has occurred much more slowly than was anticipated as recently as 1980. A modified “urban population explosion” in developing countries since the 1970s conforms to explanatory models of urban growth developed by economists around 1980. Trends in productivity and terms of trade, in particular, have been highly favorable to agriculture as compared to manufacturing, presumably slowing migration to urban centers. Increases in national population growth rates have produced less than commensurate in rates of city growth, further …
The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation, Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark
The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation, Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Female circumcision is widespread in Egypt. Research suggests that the practice persists because of a belief that circumcision will moderate female sexuality, that it will assure a girl’s marriageability, and that it is sanctioned by Islam. Using data from a nationally representative survey of adolescents, this paper investigates the prevalence and social correlates of circumcision among girls aged 10-19, the circumstances surrounding the procedure, and the attitudes of adolescents towards it. While the vast majority of adolescents are circumcised, a life table analysis indicates that girls today are at least 10 percentage points less likely to undergo female circumcision than …
Lessons From Community-Based Distribution Of Family Planning In Africa, James F. Phillips, Wendy L. Greene, Elizabeth F. Jackson
Lessons From Community-Based Distribution Of Family Planning In Africa, James F. Phillips, Wendy L. Greene, Elizabeth F. Jackson
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
This paper reviews findings and experiences from efforts to implement community-based family planning services in sub-Saharan Africa. Although research suggests that community-based service delivery can contribute to contraceptive use, the magnitude of impact is often in doubt or is considerably less than was observed in similar projects in Asia in the 1970s and 1980s. Reasons for the constrained impact of community-based family planning in Africa are reviewed and assumptions about the efficacy and mechanism of community-based distribution (CBD) are discussed. Whereas several contrasting approaches to CBD have been tried, little is known about the relative merits of alternative CBD approaches.
Population Weights In The International Order, Geoffrey Mcnicoll
Population Weights In The International Order, Geoffrey Mcnicoll
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
Population relativities play little part in the international system. A nation’s economic and military power is influenced by population size, but as one factor among many. Formal relations among states exclude population from consideration by the principle of sovereign equality. Three sources of possible change in this situation are explored, in which states would be “population-weighted” to a greater degree than before. Convergence of productivity levels around the world, expected by many, would bring the economic and population rankings of states more into line. Such convergence is occurring, but selectively and for the most part quite slowly. Anticipation of its …
Mortality Decline And The Demographic Response: Toward A New Agenda, Mark R. Montgomery
Mortality Decline And The Demographic Response: Toward A New Agenda, Mark R. Montgomery
Poverty, Gender, and Youth
A central proposition of demographic transition theory is that declines in infant and child mortality can encourage subsequent declines in fertility. Even the earliest formulations of the theory recognized that fertility decline would occur only with a lag, but neither theory nor empirical work has explored the length of such lags. This paper urges that individual perceptions and beliefs about mortality risks, conspicuously absent from the demographic research agenda, be studied directly. It proceeds to link mortality perceptions to health care decisionmaking and investments in children. The paper concludes by calling for a new agenda on mortality decline. This agenda …