Social and demographic characteristics influencing adoption of female sterilisation

This paper analyzes the relationship between the adoption of female sterilization and 3 social and modernization variables (education, income, and family type) and 2 demographic variables (number of living children and years of marriage) for a sample of 200. The influence of each of these 5 variables on female sterilization is studied by the percentage distribution method and the variance test. The data are analyzed by using the urban-rural and adopter-nonadopter classification. Results show that the social and modernization variables do not seem to influence the adoption of female sterilization among urban or rural households, but the demographic variables--number of living children and years of marriage--do seem to have a clear influence. Among rural households there are differences in these variables between adopters and nonadopters of female sterilization. There is a policy implication here: the government has to advocate the 2 child norm to all eligible couples in the early years of marriage and advise them to adopt sterilization after the birth of the 2nd child. This will go a long way in achieving the national target of the replacement level of reproduction by the year 2000.