London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, United Kingdom.
Save the Children Somalia, Somalia.
J Adolesc. 2019 Apr;72:101-111. doi: 10.1016/j.adolescence.2019.02.009. Epub 2019 Mar 14.
Child marriage, formal and informal unions when one or both spouses are under 18, disproportionately affects adolescent girls over boys. It has serious consequences for girls' health, wellbeing, and development. Little is known about the ways in which girls' agency and contextual social norms - unwritten rules of (un)acceptable behaviour in a group - intersect to affect child marriage practices. This paper investigates norms and agency as facilitators and obstacles to adolescent girls' marriage in Somaliland and Puntland.
Participants (n = 156) were men and women living in Somaliland and Puntland. We conducted 36 qualitative semi-structured individual interviews (12 men and 24 women). We also held 15 focus group discussions (8 in Somaliland and 7 in Puntland) with 6-10 people each (n = 120). Mixed focus groups were conducted with men and women together, and were segregated by age.
Technology and economic deprivation were important contextual factors in explaining the prevalence of child marriage. Participants reported that adolescent girls' and boys' increased agency contributed to, rather than decreased, child marriage. Access to technology expanded adolescents' freedom from their parents' control. Adolescents used that freedom within the existing system of social norms that rewarded early (as opposed to later) marriage.
Effective interventions that aim to reduce marriage among adolescents living in Somalia (where marriage can be a protective strategy) should integrate a social norms perspective to avoid increasing adolescent-led marriage.
童婚，即当一方或双方配偶未满 18 岁时的正式和非正式结合，对少女的影响不成比例，甚于对少男的影响。童婚对女孩的健康、幸福和发展有严重的影响。关于女孩的能动性和情境社会规范（群体中可接受和不可接受行为的不成文规则）如何相互作用影响童婚做法，人们知之甚少。本文探讨了在索马里兰和邦特兰，规范和能动性是如何成为促进和阻碍少女婚姻的因素。
参与者（n=156）是居住在索马里兰和邦特兰的男性和女性。我们进行了 36 次半结构化的定性个体访谈（12 名男性和 24 名女性）。我们还在索马里兰和邦特兰分别举行了 15 次焦点小组讨论（8 次和 7 次），每次讨论有 6-10 人参加（n=120）。男女混合焦点小组是男女一起参加的，并且按年龄分开。
技术和经济贫困是解释童婚流行的重要情境因素。参与者报告说，青少年女孩和男孩能动性的增强导致童婚增加，而不是减少。获得技术使青少年从父母的控制下获得了更大的自由。青少年在现有的社会规范体系内利用这种自由，这种体系奖励早婚（而不是晚婚）。
旨在减少生活在索马里的青少年（在那里婚姻可能是一种保护策略）结婚的有效干预措施应该结合社会规范视角，以避免增加青少年主导的婚姻。
