Child-rearing practices among nursing mothers in Ile-Ife, Nigeria.

This study attempts to highlight the relationship between the educational status of mothers in Ile-Ife and their child-rearing practices. It was observed that the educated mothers in good jobs spent less time at home with the children than the illiterates who have their children with them at the farms and in the market places. Thus, a higher proportion of the educated mothers admitted to using more bottle feeding than breast feeding, and forced hand-feeding which was practised by all the illiterate women interviewed. Only one educated woman still practices female circumcision. Of interest in the study is the fact that the children of the different categories of women are exposed to different types of health hazards; while the children of the educated suffer neglect and are deprived of the advantages of breast feeding, the children of the illiterate suffer from undue exposure to unhygienic conditions in the farms and market places and from the implications of forced hand-feeding and female circumcision.