Motherhood in Childhood

t Participants in the
Comprehensive
Empowerment
Programme for
the Reduction
of Unplanned
Pregnancies
Among Adolescent
Mothers, sponsored
by Women Across
Differences and
UNFPA.
© UNFPA Guyana
and 54 per cent have no need for contraception
because they indicate they wanted their
latest birth. According to the World Health
Organization (2008), 75 per cent of adolescent
births are categorized as “intended.”
Compared to other age groups, adolescents
who are married or in a union have both the lowest
use of contraception and the highest levels of
unmet need, hence, the lowest levels of demand
satisfied for contraception. Lack of knowledge
and fear or experience of side effects are major
reasons for non-use or discontinuation.
In countries with a high prevalence of child
marriage and a strong preference for sons, married
girls face pressures to forego contraception
until they give birth to a boy (Filmer et al.,
2008). This analysis of 5 million births in 65
countries found evidence of preference for sons
affecting fertility in South Asia, Eastern Europe,
and Central Asia.
Gender-specific attitudes and behaviours
Rigid ideals about appropriate attitudes and behaviours
of girls, boys, women and men are learned
and socially constructed norms that vary across
local contexts and interact with sociocultural factors
such as class or caste. These social and gender
norms are carried out and reinforced on multiple
levels, among individuals in peer groups and
families and through community attitudes and
practices (UNFPA, 2012a).
Differential treatment of boys and girls as they
grow up begins early, and it continues throughout
their lives. The result is that everyone—boys, girls,
men and women—absorbs messages about how
they ought or ought not to behave or think, and
early on, begin to establish divergent expectations
of themselves and other females and males. Often,
these expectations can translate into practices
and risk-taking that can have negative sexual and
reproductive health outcomes, including adolescent
pregnancy (UNFPA, 2012a). In many countries,
boys and men are culturally validated for having
multiple partners or having sex without a condom.
Many girls and young women say they do
not use contraception—even when they know
it is available and even though they have a right
to it—because their male partners oppose it or
view contraception negatively (Presler-Marshall
and Jones, 2012). The risks of ignoring male
opposition to contraception may be particularly
serious for adolescent girls who are married or in
a union. If married girls secretly use contraception,
they may face beatings, divorce or other
forms of punishment if they are caught or fail
to produce children (Presler-Marshall and Jones,
2012). Where male attitudes are the prevailing or
mainstream ones, girls may internalize these same
attitudes and express similarly negative views to
contraception.
38 CHAPTER 3: PRESSURES FROM MANY DIRECTIONS