Gender Relations and Contraceptive Use Dynamics: Longitudinal Evidence from Egypt

Fatma El-Zanaty, Egypt Demographic and Health Surveys
Laila El-Zeini, American University in Cairo

This paper examines the relationship between gender relations and contraceptive use in Egypt. The facets of gender relations examined are: rigidity of gender roles; wife's autonomy; wife's decision-making power; physical violence. The analysis uses longitudinal survey data collected in Egypt in the period 1995-1997 as a follow-up to the DHS. Roughly 2500 women were interviewed three times, with remarkably high sample retention. The longitudinal data permit the estimation of regression models in which gender relations are measured prior to contraceptive behavior and that include woman-specific effects, providing a more stringent test of the causal effect of gender relations on reproductive behavior than is usually the case in the literature on this topic. Moreover, each of the facets of gender relations is measured by numerous items. The analysis conditions contraceptive use dynamics on fertility preferences, i.e., women "in need" of contraceptive protection.