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The article focuses on a research conducted in order to explore the interrelationship between ideal family size (IFS) and women's values and beliefs in Bangladesh, Pakistan and Turkey. In Turkey, a mature respondent and an educated husband is the only significant characteristic for small IFS. In Pakistan, education is the most important factor. It is to be noted that being married to a husband with higher education translates into higher odds for relatively small IFS and lower odds for large IFS. Education of both respondent and partner in Bangladesh, plays in the direction of less likely association with large family size.

I use a representative sample of 6519 ever-married women from the TDHS 1993 to model the associations of women?s values and beliefs with ideal family size (IFS), and current practice of family planning (FP) in Turkey. I fit two multinomial logistic models to test these associations, controlling for socio-demographic background, marriage and reproductive behavior, and lifestyle. Covariates are also modeled as principal components for Moral Individualism, Fundamentalism, Conventionalism, and Pragmatism, and as linear combinations for lifestyle, gender equality, marital relationship, religious beliefs, and traditional family norms. As expected, associations of Moral Individualism with FP and with IFS are significant in positive and negative directions. This is supported at least partially by the associations with FP and IFS, of lifestyle, religious beliefs, gender equality, and traditional family norms. Structural variables are less significant, supporting in a nuanced way, the main hypothesis. Associations of socio-demographic variables with FP and IFS are weak to not significant, so is association of ethnicity and FP. Odds ratios support the well documented positive association of women?s education and FP. Husband?s religious beliefs and education stand as crucial determinants of both practice of FP and IFS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Efforts to combat HIV pandemic have been faced with persistent stigma and discrimination toward people living with HIV/AIDS. The objectives of this research are to document current levels of HIV-related stigma, and to assess factors that may influence HIV-related stigma and HIV testing with a special focus on religion as it relate to stigma. We examine levels of HIV-related stigma and HIV testing and factors associated with them in Tanzania. Data come from nationally representative samples of recent Population and AIDS Indicator Surveys. We perform tests of exogeneity for the two outcomes, prior to running regressions analysis. The primary results indicate that HIV related stigma is comparatively low in Tanzania. Stigma decreased with education and increased with misconceptions. Men were more likely to hold stigma attitudes. HIV prevention knowledge decreases stigma towards people living with HIV-AIDS. HIV testing increased with HIV prevention knowledge and the lifetime number of partners. In Tanzania, perceived HIV risk is associated with lower stigma, and with lower likelihood of HIV testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine differentials in adult Partial Life Expectancies by type of disability between two censuses within each racial group; and among white, black, Asian, and Native Americans in 1990. During the 1980s, women of minority groups benefited from an improvement in Disability Free Life Expectancy, while white women lived more years with disability. Black women experienced the most positive changes, while Native American men scored the worst. Elderly fared better than younger adults and elderly women improved regardless of race. Compared to whites in 1990, Native American males and females and black males are the most disadvantaged with higher disability free differentials. Disability data and the counts of persons are extracted from the US Censuses 1980 and 1990 (pums1 percent-). The counts of deaths come from vital statistics (100 percent- counts). The procedure of analysis developed and applied here allows a simultaneous assessment of the differentials in longevity and disability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]