Gender-Role Attitudes and Reproductive Health Communication among Female Adolescents in South Nyanza, Kenya1

Abstract

In this paper, we use data from three districts of Nyanza Province in Kenya to examine gender-role attitudes and reproductive health communication among adolescent females aged 12-19 years. We test for differences in gender-role attitudes between younger (12-15) and older (16-19) adolescents. We explore the possible association between educational attainment and gender-role attitudes by estimating a random effects model. We also examine the association between gender-role attitudes and reproductive health communication via an unordered multinomial logit model. The results show that adolescent females in this setting hold conservative views on decision making within the home and at the same time portray less conservative views concerning marriage and reproductive behaviour. We also find some differences by age regarding gender-role attitudes and reproductive health communication. Our findings further indicate that educational attainment is significantly associated with gender-role attitudes, which in turn are significantly associated with reproductive health communication.