Gopalakrishnan Lakshmi, Bertozzi Stefano, Rabe-Hesketh Sophia
Department of Health Policy and Management, Berkeley, CA, United States of America.
School of Education, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, Unites States of America.
PLoS One. 2023 Sep 28;18(9):e0292084. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0292084. eCollection 2023.
Marriage is a key determinant of health and well-being of adolescent girls and young women (AGYW) in India. It is a key life event in which girls move to their marital households, often co-residing with their in-laws and begin childbearing. The change in the normative environment in conjunction with cultural norms surrounding son preference influences women's overall life course. However, there is scant research about the association between these life transitions and changes in empowerment among AGYW in India.
Using two waves of data from prospective cohort panel dataset that followed unmarried (6,065 observations in each wave) and married AGYW (3,941 observations from each wave) over a three-year period from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, we examined how marriage, childbearing, and having a son is associated with changes in AGYW's empowerment, especially considering whether AGYW marry into patrilocal households (household with in-laws) as an effect modifier. Empowerment indicators included freedom of movement or mobility, decision-making power, access to economic using Kabeer's framework as our theoretical approach.
Marriage was associated with lower freedom of movement with a pronounced effect on those who co-resided with their in-laws. Marriage was associated with greater decision-making power for AGYW who did not co-reside with the in-laws. Motherhood was positively correlated with greater freedom of movement, marginally higher intrahousehold decision-making power, and better access to economic resources. No statistically significant evidence that having at least one son compared to having daughters only (or no daughters) conferred additional changes in girls' freedom of movement, intrahousehold decision-making power, and access to economic resources.
Findings highlight the importance of understanding the vulnerabilities of being newly married in adolescence and emphasize the need for having interventions that target newly married AGYW along with mothers-in-law to empower them.
婚姻是印度青春期女孩和年轻女性健康与幸福的关键决定因素。这是一个关键的人生事件，女孩会搬到丈夫家，通常与公婆同住，并开始生育。规范环境的变化以及围绕重男轻女的文化规范会影响女性的整体人生轨迹。然而，关于印度青春期女孩和年轻女性这些人生转变与赋权变化之间的关联，研究甚少。
利用来自前瞻性队列面板数据集的两波数据，该数据集在三年时间里跟踪了北方邦和比哈尔邦的未婚（每一波有6065个观测值）和已婚青春期女孩和年轻女性（每一波有3941个观测值），我们研究了婚姻、生育和生儿子如何与青春期女孩和年轻女性的赋权变化相关联，尤其考虑了青春期女孩和年轻女性是否嫁入从夫居家庭（与公婆同住的家庭）作为一个效应修饰因素。赋权指标包括行动自由或流动性、决策权、使用卡比尔框架作为我们的理论方法获取经济资源的机会。
婚姻与行动自由降低相关，对那些与公婆同住的人影响显著。对于不与公婆同住的青春期女孩和年轻女性，婚姻与更大的决策权相关。成为母亲与更大的行动自由、略高的家庭内部决策权以及更好地获取经济资源呈正相关。没有统计学上显著的证据表明，与只生女儿（或没有女儿）相比，至少有一个儿子会给女孩的行动自由、家庭内部决策权和获取经济资源带来额外变化。
研究结果凸显了理解青春期新婚女性脆弱性的重要性，并强调需要开展针对新婚青春期女孩和年轻女性以及婆婆的干预措施，以增强她们的权能。
