Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-28T05:08:56.206Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

MOTHER SINGLEHOOD AT FIRST BIRTH AND MORTALITY RISKS OF FIRST- AND LATER-BORN CHILDREN: THE CASE OF SENEGAL

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 March 2018

Nathalie Guilbert  and
Karine Marazyan
Nathalie Guilbert
Affiliation:
Agence Française de Développement and PSL Université Paris Dauphine LEDa, IRD, UMR DIAL
Karine Marazyan*
Affiliation:
Université Paris 1
*
Address correspondence to: Karine Marazyan, Université Paris 1 - IEDES- IRD UMR 201 Développement et Sociétés; e-mail: [email protected]
Get access

Abstract

This paper investigates the extent to which being born to a single mother affects a child’s survival rate in Senegal, a context where girls’ premarital sexual relationships are still widely stigmatized. It also examines whether any negative effect persists up to affecting the survival rate of children of higher birth order born after the mother has married. Using data from Demographic and Health Survey, we find that the mortality rate is higher for first-born boys, but not for first-born daughters, whose mother was single at the time of their birth, and lower for second-born children whose sister, but not brother, was born out of wedlock. The latter effect is actually driven by children from older cohorts of women. Therefore, strategies to mitigate the negative consequences of the stigma associated with a premarital birth seem to exist but vary with the gender of the child born premarital in Senegal. In addition, persisting negative effects appear to have decreased over time. Potential channels through which boys born from a single mother are at a higher risk of death in the country are discussed. Overall, our findings indicate that social programs targeting single mothers, especially when they gave birth to a boy, would help avoiding dramatic events as the death of a child.

Keywords

Premarital FecundityMarriageChild MortalitySenegal
Type
Research Papers
Information
Journal of Demographic Economics , Volume 84 , Special Issue 1: Gender, Family and Development , March 2018 , pp. 41 - 77
Copyright
Copyright © Université catholique de Louvain 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

We are grateful to Philippe De Vreyer, Sylvie Lambert, Sandrine Meslé-Somps and Dominique Van de Walle for precious advice on previous versions of this work, as well as participants of DIAL seminar (in Paris) and CEPS workshop on Population and Development (in Luxembourg) for their helpful comments. Remaining errors are ours.

References

REFERENCES

Abega, S. C., Tamba, L. M., Balla, C., Metomo, F. N. A., Angah, M., and Nama, N. (1994) Apprentissage et vécu de la sexualité chez les jeunes camerounais de 15 à 30 ans: rapport de mi-parcours. Technical report. World Health Organization.Google Scholar
Adjamagbo, A., Guillaume, A., Bakass, F., Bajos, N., Ferrand, M., Rossier, C., Texeira, M., Baya, B., Soubeiga, A., Sawadogo, N., Chaker, A., Gyapong, J., Beikro, L., Osei, I., Koné, P. Aguessy, Gourbin, C., Moreau, L., MayHew, S., and Collumbien, M. (2014) Decisions about unplanned pregnancies and abortion among women and men in Morocco and Senegal: Influence of norms, practices, and institutional contexts. In: Decision-Making Regarding Abortion: Determinants and Consequences. Paris: IUSSP, 31 p. multigr. Decision-Making Regarding Abortion: Determinants and Consequences: IUSSP Seminar, Nanyuki (KEN).Google Scholar
Adjamagbo, A. and Koné, P. A. (2013) Situations relationnelles et gestion des grossesses non prévues à dakar. Population 68 (1), 67–96.Google Scholar
Adjamagbo, A., Philippe, A., and Valérie, D.. (2004) Naissances prémaritales au sénégal: Confrontation de modèles urbain et rural. Cahiers québécois de démographie 33 (2), 239–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beck, S., De Vreyer, P., Lambert, S., Marazyan, K., and Safir, A. (2015) Child fostering in senegal. Journal of Comparative Family Studies 46 (1), 57–73.Google Scholar
Bledsoe, C. and Cohen, B. (1993) Social Dynamics of Adolescent Fertility in Sub-Saharan Africa, p. 208. Washington D.C., National Academy Press.Google Scholar
Calvès, A. (1999) Marginalization of african single mothers in the marriage market: Evidence from cameroon. Population Studies 53 (3), 291–301.Google Scholar
Calves, A.-E. (1996) Youth and Fertility in Cameroon. Changing Patterns of Family Formation. Ph.D. Thesis, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park.Google Scholar
Castle, S. E. (1995) Child fostering and children’s nutritional outcomes in rural mali: The role of female status in directing child transfers. Social Science & Medicine 40 (5), 679–693.Google Scholar
Clark, S. and Hamplová, D. (2013) Single motherhood and child mortality in sub-Saharan Africa: A life course perspective. Demography 50 (5), 1521–1549.Google Scholar
Coppoletta, R., De Vreyer, P., Lambert, S., and Safir, A. (2012) The Long Term Impact of Child Fostering in Senegal: Adults Fostered in Their Childhood. Technical report. Paris School of Economics.Google Scholar
Delprato, M., Akyeampong, K., and Dunne, M. (2017) Intergenerational education effects of early marriage in sub-Saharan Africa. World Development 91, 173–192.Google Scholar
Dial, F. B. (2008) Mariage et divorce à Dakar: itinéraires féminins. Karthala Editions, Karthala, Paris.Google Scholar
Dramé (2003) Étude du Comportement Sexuel en Milieu Alpular. Technical report. Dakar, Université Cheikh Anta Diop, mémoire de DEA de sociologie, p. 80.Google Scholar
Emina, J. (2011) Child Malnutrition in Cameroon: Does Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing Matter? Chap. 4, pp. 363–384. Presses univ. de Louvain. PhD Thesis.Google Scholar
Emina, J. B. (2008) How does out-of-wedlock childbearing affect household structure. Paper presented at the 2008 PAA meeting. Communication for the Population Association of America.Google Scholar
Faye, C., Speizer, I., Fotso, J., Corroon, M., and Koumtingue, D. (2013) Unintended pregnancy: Magnitude and correlates in six urban sites in senegal. Reproductive Health 10, 59.Google Scholar
Gage, A. and Meekers, D. (1994) Sexual activity before marriage in sub-Saharan Africa. Social Biology 41 (1/2), 44–60.Google Scholar
Garenne, M. (2008) Fertility Changes in Sub-Saharan Africa. Technical report, DHS Comparative Reports No. 18. Calverton, MD, USA: Macro International Inc.Google Scholar
Garenne, M. and Zwang, J. (2006) Premarital Fertility and Ethnicity in Africa. Technical report, DHS Comparative Reports No. 13. Calverton, MD, USA: Macro International Inc. 87 p.Google Scholar
Gibson, M. A. and Mace, R. (2007) Polygyny, reproductive success and child health in rural ethiopia: Why marry a married man? Journal of Biosocial Science 39 (2), 287.Google Scholar
Guilbert, N. (2013) Early Marriage, Women Empowerment and Child Mortality: Married Too Young to be a “Good Mother”. Working Paper UMR DIAL, Paris.Google Scholar
Hobcraft, J. (1993) Women’s education, child welfare and child survival: A review of the evidence. Health Transition Review 3 (2), 159–175.Google Scholar
Johnson-Hanks, J. (2005) Sexual stigma and infant mortality in sub-Saharan Africa. Paper presented at the 2005 IUSSP meeting. Proceedings of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.Google Scholar
Lester, D. (1992) Infant mortality and illegitimacy. Social Science & Medicine 35 (5), 739–740.Google Scholar
Locoh, T. (2002) Baisse de la fécondité et mutations familiales en Afrique subsaharienne. Working paper, INED, Paris.Google Scholar
Mahy, M. (2003) Childhood Mortality in the Developing World: A Review of Evidence from the Demographic and Health Surveys, DHS Comparative Reports No. 4. ORC Macro. Calverton, Maryland USA.Google Scholar
Marazyan, K. (2011) Effects of a sibship extension to foster children on children’s school enrolment: A sibling rivalry analysis for indonesia. Journal of Development Studies 47 (3), 497–518.Google Scholar
Meekers, D. (1994) The implications of premarital childbearing for infant mortality: The case of côte dívoire. In Nuptiality in Sub-Saharan Africa: Contemporary Anthropological and Demographic Perspectives, pp. 296–312.Google Scholar
Ntoimo, L. and Odimegwu, C. (2014) Health effects of single motherhood on children in sub-saharan africa: A cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health 14, 1145.Google Scholar
Omariba, D. W. R. and Boyle, M. H. (2007) Family structure and child mortality in sub-saharan africa: Cross-national effects of polygyny. Journal of Marriage and Family 69 (2), 528–543.Google Scholar
Reynolds, R. M., Labad, J., Buss, C., Ghaemmaghami, P., and Räikkönen, K. (2013) Transmitting biological effects of stress in utero: Implications for mother and offspring. Psychoneuroendocrinology 38 (9), 1843–1849.Google Scholar
Sekhri, S. and Debnath, S. (2014) Intergenerational consequences of early age marriages of girls: Effect on childrens human capital. Journal of Development Studies 50 (12), 1670–1686.Google Scholar
Thiriat, M. (1999) Les unions libres en afrique subsaharienne. Cahiers québécois de démographie, 28 (1-2), 81–115.Google Scholar
Van de Walle, E. and Meekers, D. (1994) Marriage drinks and kola nuts. In C.B. Ledsoe and G. Pison (eds.) Nuptiality in Sub-Saharan Africa: Contemporary Anthropological and Demographic Perspectives, Clarendon Press, Oxford, pp. 25–54.Google Scholar
Wadhwa, P. D., Entringer, S., Buss, C., and Lu, M. C. (2011) The contribution of maternal stress to preterm birth: Issues and considerations. Clinics in Perinatology 38 (3), 351–384.Google Scholar
Wagner, N. and Rieger, M. (2015) Polygyny and child growth: Evidence from twenty-six african countries. Feminist Economics 21 (2), 105–130.Google Scholar
Winikoff, B. (1983) The effects of birth spacing on child and maternal health. Studies in Family Planning 14 (10), 231–245.Google Scholar