M. Kabir

Participation of adolescents in household decision-making process in Bangladesh

Background: The decision-making authority is one of the ways of measuring the female empowerment, although mere participation in any matter does not corroborate full empowerment of women. However, participation in decision-making process in household matters considers that a female is accounted in the family. Objective: The present study investigated to the extent at which the female adolescents participated in decision-making process in household matters and assessed the factors influencing them. Study Setting: Both rural and urban areas of Bangladesh. Study Design: A quantitative and a qualitative study designs were adopted for this study. Sample Size and Sampling: A cluster sampling technique was used to select the sample. A sample of 3362 female adolescents irrespective of their marital status was selected using a cluster sampling technique. To complement the results found in quantitative analysis, a series of focus group discussions were also conducted among the adolescents. Results: The analysis revealed that a large proportion of the study adolescents did not participate in any decision-making process in their household matters. Only about one-third (31.1%) of the adolescents participated in any household matter; however, the acceptance of their opinions was minimal. In spite of little participation of adolescents in family matters, multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that older adolescents aged 15-19 years, years of schooling, work status, and the family members with a positive attitude toward female education appeared to be the influencing factors for adolescent participation in household affairs ( P ). Conclusions : The study concluded that gainful economic activities of adolescents and female education are the key elements for participation of female adolescents in different household matters.

Factors influencing utilisation of adolescent maternal care: An explorative study

Cross sectional data collected from rural and urban areas of Bangladesh to assess the pattern of utilisation of maternal care and the factors influencing it showed that about 58% of the adolescent mothers did not receive any maternal care during pregnancy. In multivariate logistic regression, the level of education of the mothers was significantly associated with antenatal care-seeking, but did not predict utilisation of delivery care. It was complications during delivery that compelled mothers to take care from qualified persons; otherwise they preferred delivery by non-qualified birth attendants. A variety of societal factors such as gender inequality and intra household power imbalance are likely to have been at work, which suggests that care providers and policy makers need to consider not only the resources of the health care system, but also knowledge and attitudes of women, their families, and the community.