The community-level effects of women's education on reproductive behaviour in rural Ghana

Early Marriage, Cohabitation, and Childbearing in West Africa

“…The effect of neighbourhood factors on the health and behaviors of young people correspond strongly across the life course, from childhood to adult life, and are crucial for the health and economic development of a community. Consistent with previous research, community characteristics have an effect on the reproductive behavior [31]. However, this has largely been demonstrated for limiting fertility—e.g., contraceptive use—and for infant and child mortality [32] than for early marriage.…”

Further evidence of community education effects on fertility in sub-Saharan Africa

“…In addition, it has been concluded in some recent studies from subSaharan Africa that, when women with the same level of education are compared, those who live in communities where others have relatively high education tend to have the lowest fertility (Kravdal 2002;DeRose and Kravdal 2007). Such associations that are indicative of externality effects of education have also been reported in fertility studies from other regions (Hirschman and Young 2000) and in investigations of fertility desires (Moursund and Kravdal 2003;Baschieri 2007) or contraceptive use (Benefo 2006(Benefo , 2010DeRose, Wu, and Dodoo 2010;McNay et al 2003;Moursund and Kravdal 2003;Stephenson et al 2007;Stephenson, Beke, and Tshibangu 2008) in various developing countries, with a variety of additional factors included (more or less appropriately) in the models. There are also studies, however, where associations have not shown up (Gupta and Mahy 2003;Yabiku 2006).…”

Spousal and Household Characteristics Associated with Women’s Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…Ikamari (2005) in a study of the influence of education on marriage timing in Kenya found that women who are more educated married later and this further increased their age at first birth. Other studies on education-fertility relationship found that education above the primary level influenced fertility more (Gupta & Mahy, 2003;Kravdal, 2001;Shapiro, 2012) while some found the community level education as an important predictor of fertility in addition to individual woman's education (Benefo, 2006;Kravdal, 2002Kravdal, , 2012Moursund & Kravdal, 2003). If women's age and age at marriage and their level of education attainment have been found to influence their fertility, it is pertinent to also examine the influence of spousal age, age at marriage and their educational attainment on women's fertility as well.…”