Science Journal of Public Health

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Knowledge, Approach and Status of Early Marriage in Bangladesh

Received: 19 March 2014    Accepted: 09 April 2014    Published: 20 April 2014
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Abstract

Early marriage is a key indicator to assess the development of a nation. Early marriage is specifically associated with some unavoidable predicament like social and physical outcomes, mood disorders, depression, anxiety, obsessive and makes dismay. Even the possibilities of iron and calcium deficiency in pregnancy under the age of 18 will be increased which leads to osteoporosis and anaemia. It also enhances the risk of Cervical Cancer as well. A descriptive type of cross sectional study was conducted to assess the knowledge, approach and status of early marriage in Bangladesh where 300 eligible couples of the reproductive age were taken as sample. Data was collected through structured questionnaire by face to face interview and analyzed by SPSS version 17.0 including descriptive statistic using mean, standard deviation, percentage, Chi-square test to describe the association. The respondents got married at the age of 16.19±3.522 (Female) (Mean±SD) years and 22.22±10.532 (Male) years where the frequency of early marriage was 65% in Bangladesh. Only 22% respondents had no standard education and 63.3% female respondents were housewife which showed that the rate of literacy and working women is increasing in Bangladesh even a significant association exists between age of early marriage and occupation of the respondents (x2 10.433 with P value 0.034). 81.3% respondents were nuclear family and had a significant relation between type of the family and age of the early marriage (x2 4.136 with P value 0.042). Average monthly household income was 12,226±5,787.366 taka where 10.3% had <5000 taka and 4% had income >20000 taka. 55.33% had no marriage registration and 15.3% had no child birth registration of their child. All the respondents agreed to stop early marriage and showed positive attitude where 99% thought for female <18 years will not suitable for marriage. These study results specifically showed the necessity of Bangladesh to give more attention on this issue to graduate from Least Developed Country (LDC) list

DOI 10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14
Published in Science Journal of Public Health (Volume 2, Issue 3, May 2014)
Page(s) 165-168
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Childhood Marriage, Child Marriage, Adolescent Marriage, Forced Marriage, Bangladesh

References
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[2] The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) 1979; article 16.2, http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/text/econvention.htm#article16
[3] Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)-1989
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[5] World Health Organization, Media Centre, Child Marriages: 39,000 every day, New York, March 7, 2013, Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2013/child_marriage_20130307/en/
[6] UNICEF. Child marriage in South Asia: A Discussion Paper. [Online] Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.unicef.org/rosa/earlymarriage(lastversion).doc
[7] United Nations Population Fund, Marrying Too Young: End Child Marriage, 64 (2012), Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/documents/publications/2012/MarryingTooYoung.pdf
[8] United Nations Children’s Fund. Child protection from violence, exploitation and abuse. New York: United Nations Children’s Fund; 2012. Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.unicef.org/protection/57929_58008.html
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[11] Chaturvedi S., Kapil U., Bhanthi T., Gnanasekaran N., and Pandey R.M., Nutritional status of married adolescent girls in rural Rajasthan. Indian J Pediatr. 1994; 61(6):695-701.
[12] Rudäng R., Mellström D., Clark E., Ohlsson C., and Lorentzon M. Advancing maternal age is associated with lower bone mineral density in young adult male offspring. Osteoporos Int. 2012; 23(2):475-82.
[13] Nour N.M., Health consequences of child marriage in Africa. Emerg Infect Dis. 2006; 12(11):1644-9.
[14] Kuhn L., Denny L., Pollack A., Lorincz A., Richart R., and Wright T., Human papillomavirus DNA testing for cervical cancer screening in low resource settings. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2000; 92:818–25.
[15] UNICEF, State of the World’s Children, 2009, Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.unicef.org/sowc09/docs/SOWC09-FullReport-EN.pdf
[16] United Nations Population Fund, and United Nations Children’s Fund, 2010, Women’s & Children’s Rights: Making the connection, UNFPA, New York, p. 39.
[17] Women and Children Legal Research Foundation. Early Marriage in Afghanistan. Deh-Bori: Women and Children Legal Research Foundation; 2008
[18] Hossein Matlabi1, Ahmad Rasouli, Hamidreza Hamedi Behtash, Ali Faraghi Dastjerd, Behnaz Khazemi. Factors Responsible for Early and Forced Marriage in Iran. Science Journal of Public Health. Vol. 1, No. 5, 2013, pp. 227-229. doi: 10.11648/j.sjph.20130105.17
[19] National Survey on Child Marriage by Plan Bangladesh and icddr,b-2013, Retrieved March, 2014 from http://plan-international.org/where-we-work/asia/bangladesh/about/publications/national-survey-on-child-marriage-by-plan-bangladesh-and-icddr-b
[20] Bangladesh Literacy Survey, 2010, Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.bbs.gov.bd/webtestapplication/userfiles/image/Survey%20reports/Bangladesh%20Literacy%20Surver%202010f.pdf
[21] Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey 2007 , Retrieved March, 2014 from http://www.unicef.org/bangladesh/BDHS2007_Final.pdf
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Author Information
  • Atish Dipankar University of Science and Technology, ARA Estate, 69/E Kazi Biruttam Nuruzzaman Road, Dhaka, Bangladesh; Institute of Appropriate Technology (IAT), Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Polashi, Dhaka, Bangladesh

  • Atish Dipankar University of Science and Technology, ARA Estate, 69/E Kazi Biruttam Nuruzzaman Road, Dhaka, Bangladesh; Directorate General of Family Planning, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, 6-Kawran Bazar, Dhaka, Bangladesh

  • Atish Dipankar University of Science and Technology, ARA Estate, 69/E Kazi Biruttam Nuruzzaman Road, Dhaka, Bangladesh

  • Institute of Appropriate Technology (IAT), Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Polashi, Dhaka, Bangladesh

  • Mymensingh Medical College, Chorpara, Mymensingh, Bangladesh

Cite This Article
  • APA Style

    A.K.M. Fahmidul Haque, Md. Niajur Rahman, Arif-uz-Zaman Khan, Israt Jahan Mukti, Begum Lutfunnahar. (2014). Knowledge, Approach and Status of Early Marriage in Bangladesh. Science Journal of Public Health, 2(3), 165-168. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14

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    ACS Style

    A.K.M. Fahmidul Haque; Md. Niajur Rahman; Arif-uz-Zaman Khan; Israt Jahan Mukti; Begum Lutfunnahar. Knowledge, Approach and Status of Early Marriage in Bangladesh. Sci. J. Public Health 2014, 2(3), 165-168. doi: 10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14

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    AMA Style

    A.K.M. Fahmidul Haque, Md. Niajur Rahman, Arif-uz-Zaman Khan, Israt Jahan Mukti, Begum Lutfunnahar. Knowledge, Approach and Status of Early Marriage in Bangladesh. Sci J Public Health. 2014;2(3):165-168. doi: 10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14

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  • @article{10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14,
      author = {A.K.M. Fahmidul Haque and Md. Niajur Rahman and Arif-uz-Zaman Khan and Israt Jahan Mukti and Begum Lutfunnahar},
      title = {Knowledge, Approach and Status of Early Marriage in Bangladesh},
      journal = {Science Journal of Public Health},
      volume = {2},
      number = {3},
      pages = {165-168},
      doi = {10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.sjph.20140203.14},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.sjph.20140203.14},
      abstract = {Early marriage is a key indicator to assess the development of a nation. Early marriage is specifically associated with some unavoidable predicament like social and physical outcomes, mood disorders, depression, anxiety, obsessive and makes dismay. Even the possibilities of iron and calcium deficiency in pregnancy under the age of 18 will be increased which leads to osteoporosis and anaemia. It also enhances the risk of Cervical Cancer as well. A descriptive type of cross sectional study was conducted to assess the knowledge, approach and status of early marriage in Bangladesh where 300 eligible couples of the reproductive age were taken as sample. Data was collected through structured questionnaire by face to face interview and analyzed by SPSS version 17.0 including descriptive statistic using mean, standard deviation, percentage, Chi-square test to describe the association. The respondents got married at the age of 16.19±3.522 (Female) (Mean±SD) years and 22.22±10.532 (Male) years where the frequency of early marriage was 65% in Bangladesh. Only 22% respondents had no standard education and 63.3% female respondents were housewife which showed that the rate of literacy and working women is increasing in Bangladesh even a significant association exists between age of early marriage and occupation of the respondents (x2 10.433 with P value 0.034). 81.3% respondents were nuclear family and had a significant relation between type of the family and age of the early marriage (x2 4.136 with P value 0.042). Average monthly household income was 12,226±5,787.366 taka where 10.3% had 20000 taka. 55.33% had no marriage registration and 15.3% had no child birth registration of their child. All the respondents agreed to stop early marriage and showed positive attitude where 99% thought for female <18 years will not suitable for marriage. These study results specifically showed the necessity of Bangladesh to give more attention on this issue to graduate from Least Developed Country (LDC) list},
     year = {2014}
    }
    

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    AU  - A.K.M. Fahmidul Haque
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    AB  - Early marriage is a key indicator to assess the development of a nation. Early marriage is specifically associated with some unavoidable predicament like social and physical outcomes, mood disorders, depression, anxiety, obsessive and makes dismay. Even the possibilities of iron and calcium deficiency in pregnancy under the age of 18 will be increased which leads to osteoporosis and anaemia. It also enhances the risk of Cervical Cancer as well. A descriptive type of cross sectional study was conducted to assess the knowledge, approach and status of early marriage in Bangladesh where 300 eligible couples of the reproductive age were taken as sample. Data was collected through structured questionnaire by face to face interview and analyzed by SPSS version 17.0 including descriptive statistic using mean, standard deviation, percentage, Chi-square test to describe the association. The respondents got married at the age of 16.19±3.522 (Female) (Mean±SD) years and 22.22±10.532 (Male) years where the frequency of early marriage was 65% in Bangladesh. Only 22% respondents had no standard education and 63.3% female respondents were housewife which showed that the rate of literacy and working women is increasing in Bangladesh even a significant association exists between age of early marriage and occupation of the respondents (x2 10.433 with P value 0.034). 81.3% respondents were nuclear family and had a significant relation between type of the family and age of the early marriage (x2 4.136 with P value 0.042). Average monthly household income was 12,226±5,787.366 taka where 10.3% had 20000 taka. 55.33% had no marriage registration and 15.3% had no child birth registration of their child. All the respondents agreed to stop early marriage and showed positive attitude where 99% thought for female <18 years will not suitable for marriage. These study results specifically showed the necessity of Bangladesh to give more attention on this issue to graduate from Least Developed Country (LDC) list
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