TITLE:
Contextual Influence on Age at Marriage in Uttar Pradesh-India
AUTHORS:
Arvind Mohan, Ajay Pandey, Richa Sharma
KEYWORDS:
Age at Marriage, Community, Mass Media
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Statistics,
Vol.9 No.1,
January
24,
2019
ABSTRACT: Female
age at marriage in Uttar Pradesh is amongst the lowest in India. Previous
studies on female age at marriage in an Indian context primarily focused on the
individual level factors impacting female age at marriage. Community level
factors that influence the female age at marriage in Uttar Pradesh were
non-existent. In this study, the impact of community presence of mass media is studied using
Hierarchical Linear Models. Thus using the data from NFHS-2, the
study explores the within community presence of any forms of print, electronic
or local mass media and its impact on female age at marriage in Uttar Pradesh.
Total of 7175 currently married individual women were nested in 317 rural
communities across Uttar Pradesh. Hierarchal linear modeling using SAS PROC
MIXED was used in the study. The intra-class correlation of 0.13 indicates fair
bit of clustering of female age at marriage within communities. Thirteen
percent of the differences in female age at marriage are due to between
community differences in Uttar Pradesh. Communities’ exposure to any forms of
mass media has a positive impact on female age at marriage in Uttar Pradesh.