Instead of focussing excessively on rankings with well-recognised shortcomings, recognising achievements and refining goals consistent with national priorities will be a more fruitful approach.
NCAER - NATIONAL DATA INNOVATION CENTRE
Instead of focussing excessively on rankings with well-recognised shortcomings, recognising achievements and refining goals consistent with national priorities will be a more fruitful approach.
NCAER National Data Innovation Centre
Measurement Brief | 2024-03
Welcome to the sixth issue of GenderTalk from the NCAER-National Data Innovation Centre’s Gender Hub. In this issue, we focus on the complex realities of adolescence in India— a critical stage of human development when the pressure on young girls and boys to conform to culturally prescribed gender roles intensifies, shaping their experiences and future trajectories.
GenderTalk is a space where scholars, policymakers, and civil society members can engage with each other on a theme vital to women’s well-being in India. For previous issues, scroll to the bottom.
In particular, this brief discusses the following:
1. Gender and Adolescence Realities: Identifying Data Gaps and Priorities – Dibyasree Ganguly, NCAER, examines the differences in gender parity among adolescents engaged in daily activities while highlighting the need for further discussion and nationally representative data to better understand the prevalence of gender inequity in the country. [Read more]
2. Learning to Be Gendered: Gender Socialisation in Early Adolescence Among the Urban Poor in Delhi, India, and Shanghai, China – In a first of its kind comparative analysis between adolescents in China and India, Sharmishtha Basu, GIZ India, identifies the sources and processes of the emergence of differences in gender equity in 11 to 13 year olds in Delhi and Shanghai. [Read more]
3. Gender-unequal treatment in the home: Associations with mental health among Indian adolescents- Lisa Strohschein, University of Alberta, examines the decline in mental health of adolescents due to the adverse effects of experiences of gender inequality at home.[Read more]
4. Understanding Gender Normative Beliefs and Girls’ Agency in India: What we know and why it matters– Anita Raj, Tulane University, identifies palpable links between traditional gender values defined by the socially limited value of women and the agency of women in the wake of transforming gender norms which support women’s decision making.[Read more]
5. Equitable Gender Attitudes and Norms must be Promoted during Adolescence – Ravi Verma, ICRW, explores the formation of inequitable gender norms during adolescence, highlighting the urgent need to challenge traditional societal inequalities and involve boys in fostering gender sensitivity from an early age.
[Read more]
6. Conversation with Abhimanyu Singh, Shobhita Rajagopal, and Mukta Gupta – Doosra Dashak. Representatives from Doosra Dashak delve into the impact created by the organisation’s work in giving adolescents a second chance at life by creating opportunities tailored to their needs and imbibing them with a sense of self-worth. [Read more]
READS…from around the web
Aggarwal, S., Francis, K. L., Dashti, S. G., & Patton, G.(2023). Child marriage and the mental health of adolescent girls: a longitudinal cohort study from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, India. The Lancet Regional Health-Southeast Asia, 8. Link
Aurino, E. (2017). Do boys eat better than girls in India?Longitudinal evidence on dietary diversity and food consumption disparities among children and adolescents. Economics & Human Biology, 25, 99-111. Link
Dandona, R., Pandey, A., Kumar, G. A., Arora, M., & Dandona, L. (2024). Review of the India Adolescent Health Strategy in the context of disease burden among adolescents. The Lancet Regional Health-Southeast Asia, 20. Link
Datta, S., & Kingdon, G. G. (2019). Gender bias in intra-household allocation of education in India: Has it fallen over time?. Discussion paper series, IZA DP No. 12671. IZA Institute of Labor Economics. Link
Ganguly, D., Goli, S., & Sullivan, O. (2023). Gender, paid work, and mental health of adolescents and young adults in resource-poor settings of India. Child Indicators Research, 16(3), 1137-1170. Link
Raj, A., Singh, A., Silverman, J. G., Bhan, N., Barker, K. M., & McDougal, L. (2022). Freedom of movement and adolescent sexual violence in India. Journal of interpersonal violence, 37(1-2), NP925-NP943. Link
Click here to download the current measurement brief.
This measurement brief is part of the Gender Hub led by Dr. Pallavi Choudhuri and Dr. Sonalde Desai. The Gender Hub initiative is a part of the National Data Innovation Centre at the National Council of Applied Economic Research. GenderTalk, is a space where scholars, policymakers, and civil society members can engage with each other on a theme vital to women’s well-being in India.
Our website can be found at https://ndic.ncaer.org/research-theme/gender-data-hub/.
Previous Issues of GenderTalk:
2024-02: Gender and Ageing; | Download
2024-01: Gender and Internal Migration; | Download
2023-03: Women’s Agency in Marriage Choice; | Download
India proved that development is the best contraceptive. Now, we need to focus on adapting to the demographic destiny through careful planning.
We’ve made the right choices, the next step is fixing the pieces of the population puzzle.
India’s growing economy is lifting families out of poverty but often onto a precarious perch. A single disaster can push them right back. Policy, obsessed with counting the poor, ignores the question of helping ‘newly poor’.
Background: Fertility histories are subject to measurement errors such as incorrect birth dates, incorrect birth orders, incorrect sex, and omissions. These errors can bias demographic estimates such as fertility rates and child mortality rates.
Objective: We focus on births missing in fertility histories. We estimate the prevalence of such omissions and study their associated factors.
Methods: We leverage a panel survey (the India Human Development Survey) where the same women were interviewed in two waves several years apart. We compare data across waves and identify omitted births. Omissions in the second wave are modeled as a function of several child, mother, household, and survey interviewer variables. Models are fit separately to omissions reported alive or dead in the first wave.
Results: We conservatively estimate the prevalence of omissions at 4%. A large majority of omitted births are those of dead children, especially infants, with children in poorer households at greater risk of being omitted. For children alive in wave 1, female children are much more likely to be omitted in wave 2 compared to male children. Interviewers can detect respondent behaviors associated with omissions.
Conclusions: Omissions in fertility histories are non-ignorable. They do not randomly occur, and they affect some population subgroups and some interview contexts more than others.
Contribution: We investigate the understudied but important phenomenon of omitted births in fertility histories. We bring attention to possible biases in demographic estimates. We shed light on the survey process and propose strategies for minimizing bias through improved survey design.
