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Social network associations with contraceptive use among Cameroonian women in voluntary associations

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  • Valente, Thomas W.
  • Watkins, Susan C.
  • Jato, Miriam N.
  • Van Der Straten, Ariane
  • Tsitsol, Louis-Philippe M.

Abstract

This paper examines the association between social networks and contraceptive use. Using data from a survey of women belonging to voluntary associations in Yaoundé, Cameroon, we find that the behavior and characteristics of the members of a respondent's personal networks are associated with her contraceptive use, over and above a set of her own individual characteristics that are usually found to be important. Respondents who report that their network partners approve of contraception, use it, and encourage the respondent to use are more likely to use contraception themselves; the association with encouragement is particularly strong. Moreover, there is a strong association between the specific methods of contraception used by a respondent and those used by her network partners, suggesting that members of personal networks exchange and evaluate specific methods. Because most of the respondent's network partners were interviewed, we are able to compare the respondent's perceptions of contraceptive use by her network partners with the network partner's actual use. We find that it is perceptions of use that matter, even if those perception are incorrect.

Suggested Citation

  • Valente, Thomas W. & Watkins, Susan C. & Jato, Miriam N. & Van Der Straten, Ariane & Tsitsol, Louis-Philippe M., 1997. "Social network associations with contraceptive use among Cameroonian women in voluntary associations," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 45(5), pages 677-687, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:45:y:1997:i:5:p:677-687
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    Cited by:

    1. Gayen, Kaberi & Raeside, Robert, 2007. "Social networks, normative influence and health delivery in rural Bangladesh," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(5), pages 900-914, September.
    2. Alexander A. Weinreb, 2014. "Heterophily in rural Malawi," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 31(50), pages 1477-1502.
    3. Christoph Bühler & Dimiter Philipov, 2005. "Social Capital Related to Fertility: Theoretical Foundations and Empirical Evidence from Bulgaria," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 3(1), pages 53-81.
    4. Steven Goodreau & James Kitts & Martina Morris, 2009. "Birds of a feather, or friend of a friend? using exponential random graph models to investigate adolescent social networks," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 46(1), pages 103-125, February.
    5. Jere Behrman & Hans-Peter Kohler & Susan Watkins, 2002. "Social networks and changes in contraceptive use over time: Evidence from a longitudinal study in rural Kenya," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 39(4), pages 713-738, November.
    6. Christoph Bühler & Ewa Fratczak, 2005. "Learning from others and receiving support: the impact of personal networks on fertility intentions in Poland," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2005-017, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    7. Kabeya Clement Mulamba, 2023. "The role of male partners in modern contraceptive use by women in South Africa: Does space also matter?," Journal of Population Research, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 1-23, June.
    8. Perkins, Jessica M. & Subramanian, S.V. & Christakis, Nicholas A., 2015. "Social networks and health: A systematic review of sociocentric network studies in low- and middle-income countries," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 60-78.
    9. Fotouhi, Babak & Rytina, Steven, 2018. "Mathematical Modeling and Inference for Degree-capped Ego-centric Network Sampling," SocArXiv 5kez8, Center for Open Science.
    10. Christoph Bühler & Dimiter Philipov, 2005. "Social capital related to fertility: theoretical foundations and empirical evidence from Bulgaria," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2005-016, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    11. Lesley Newson & Peter J. Richerson, 2009. "Why Do People Become Modern? A Darwinian Explanation," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 35(1), pages 117-158, March.
    12. Chimbiri, Agnes M., 2007. "The condom is an 'intruder' in marriage: Evidence from rural Malawi," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(5), pages 1102-1115, March.
    13. Heidi Colleran & Ruth Mace, 2015. "Social network and community level influences on contraceptive use: evidence from rural Poland," Post-Print hal-04313952, HAL.
    14. Edmonds, Joyce K. & Hruschka, Daniel & Bernard, H. Russell & Sibley, Lynn, 2012. "Women’s social networks and birth attendant decisions: Application of the Network-Episode Model," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(3), pages 452-459.
    15. Sho Tsugawa & Yukihiro Matsumoto & Hiroyuki Ohsaki, 2015. "On the robustness of centrality measures against link weight quantization in social networks," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 21(3), pages 318-339, September.
    16. Gayen, Kaberi & Raeside, Robert, 2010. "Social networks and contraception practice of women in rural Bangladesh," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(9), pages 1584-1592, November.
    17. Laura Bernardi & Andreas Klärner, 2014. "Social networks and fertility," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 30(22), pages 641-670.
    18. Winfred Avogo & Victor Agadjanian, 2013. "Men’s Migration, Women’s Personal Networks, and Responses to HIV/AIDS in Mozambique," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-21, March.
    19. Ebbes, Peter & Huang, Zan & Rangaswamy, Arvind, 2016. "Sampling designs for recovering local and global characteristics of social networks," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 578-599.
    20. Susan Watkins & Ina Warriner, 2003. "How do we know we need to control for selectivity?," Demographic Research Special Collections, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 1(4), pages 109-142.
    21. Karen File & Thomas Valente & Mary-Louise McLaws, 2018. "Hygiene and Health: Who Do Mothers in Vanuatu Communicate with about Health?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(3), pages 1-14, March.
    22. Sylvia Keim & Andreas Klärner & Laura Bernardi, 2009. "Who is relevant? Exploring fertility relevant social networks," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2009-001, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    23. Anna Lunn, 2020. "Urban family ties and household latrines in rural India: A cross-sectional analysis of national data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(7), pages 1-19, July.
    24. Mertens, Frédéric & Saint-Charles, Johanne & Mergler, Donna, 2012. "Social communication network analysis of the role of participatory research in the adoption of new fish consumption behaviors," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(4), pages 643-650.

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