1. Women's empowerment and its differential impact on health in low-income communities in Mumbai, India.
- Author
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Moonzwe Davis, Lwendo, Schensul, Stephen L., Schensul, Jean J., Verma, Ravi K., Nastasi, Bonnie K., and Singh, Rajendra
- Subjects
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STATISTICAL correlation , *GROUNDED theory , *HEALTH status indicators , *INTERVIEWING , *POVERTY , *REGRESSION analysis , *RESEARCH funding , *STATISTICAL sampling , *SCALE analysis (Psychology) , *SELF-efficacy , *SELF-evaluation , *WOMEN'S health , *THEMATIC analysis , *DATA analysis software , *DESCRIPTIVE statistics - Abstract
This paper examines the relationship of empowerment to women's self-reported general health status and women's self-reported health during pregnancy in low-income communities in Mumbai. The data on which this paper is based were collected in three study communities located in a marginalised area of Mumbai. We draw on two data sources: in-depth qualitative interviews conducted with 66 married women and a survey sample of 260 married women. Our analysis shows that empowerment functions differently in relation to women's reproductive status. Non-pregnant women with higher levels of empowerment experience greater general health problems, while pregnant women with higher levels of empowerment are less likely to experience pregnancy-related health problems. We explain this non-intuitive finding and suggest that a globally defined empowerment measure for women may be less useful that one that is contextually and situationally defined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2014
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