Women’s autonomy, education and birth intervals: visiting the less familiar

Using data from the third National Family Health Survey (NFHS-3-2005-2006) on currently married fecund women with at least one child and Cox-proportional hazard models, this study attempts to address the less familiar association between women’s autonomy and birth-to-conception intervals (BI) in India. It also examines whether women’s autonomy can explain much of the relationship between education and birth interval. It even examines whether education has any influence in the relationship between autonomy and birth intervals. Most research in this area has considered the association between women’s autonomy and contraceptive use and lower fertility. In addition, while some researcher (e.g., Jejeebhoy, 1995) have suggested that women’s autonomy may be a key pathway through which education influences fertility, others (e.g. Basu, 1996) have convincingly argued that there is still little quantitative evidence in support of the importance of women’s autonomy as a mediating factor between education and fertility.
Our results indicate that after adjusting for demographic, socioeconomic factors and use of contraceptive for spacing purpose, women’s autonomy remained a significant predictor of birth-to-conception intervals. However, autonomy is not found mediating the relationship between education and birth intervals.