Women's health access and behaviors: Effects of urban residence, education, self-determination and social supports in Ghana.
Open Access
- Author:
- Boateng, John Kwame
- Graduate Program:
- Agricultural Education
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- October 16, 2006
- Committee Members:
- Constance A Flanagan, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Tena Lloyd St Pierre, Committee Member
Anastasia R Snyder, Committee Member
Edgar Paul Yoder, Committee Member - Keywords:
- health care
sexual behavior
health access
Ghana - Abstract:
- Ghanaian women’s access to health care and behaviors were analyzed using the 2003 Ghana Demographic and Health Survey (GDHS) couple’s dataset. The 2003 GDHS is a nationally representative survey designed to supply data to facilitate the monitoring of the population and health situation in Ghana as a follow up to the 1988, 1993, and 1998 GDHS. In this study the couple’s dataset consisting of 2133 couples was analyzed and only female respondents were included. The number of women who provided answers to two of the dependent variables in this study was lower: for responsible sexual health behavior the N was 1714 and for hygiene behavior the N was 1228 women. There was a consistent positive educational effect on physical access to health care, hygiene and prevention behaviors. Contrary to the hypothesis, there was no significant effect of women’s education on psychological access to health care. Urban living provided consistent positive results for physical and psychological access, hygiene and malaria prevention but did not significantly improve responsible sexual behavior. There were mixed results for matriliny. There was evidence that the self determination and social support variables added explanatory power in the models. For malaria prevention, these variables added explanatory power but did not mediate any effects of education, residence, or lineage. With respect to physical access and hygiene behavior the self determination and support network variables explained additional variance and mediated some of the effects of the demographic variables.