Spouse Differential in Fertility and Contraceptive Intentions in Three Culturally Contrasting States of India

Laishram Ladusingh, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)
Faujdar Ram, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)
Balram Paswan, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)
Nizamuddin Khan, International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS)

Fertility and contraceptive intentions are normally influenced by the bargaining strengths and preferences of those involved in decision-making. In the present paper, we investigate the fertility intentions of wives and husbands and the degree of concordance in demand for children, contraceptive practices and contraceptive intentions in three culturally contrasting states of Andhra Pradesh, Punjab and Orissa in India. The data is from the Reproductive and Child Health (RCH) district level households survey in India. In all the three states we have studied the joint agreement of wives and husbands in additional children desired weakens with increasing parity. The joint agreement is also strong among wives and husbands for couples with children of one sex only. A large percentage of both wives and husbands are undecided about future intention of contraceptive use invariant of number of children ever born and sex composition of the living children.