ArticleSSM - population health2019
Developing and testing measures of reproductive decision-making agency in Nepal.
Article in SSM - population health, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 26 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
26 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 46 citations in OpenAlex.
- Measures of women's empowerment based on individual-level data: a literature review with a focus on the methodological approaches.Frontiers in sociology · 2023Pooled it
- Women empowerment in reproductive health: a systematic review of measurement properties.BMC women's health · 2021Pooled it
- Trial
- Development of a comprehensive measure of reproductive coercion and abuse for global use: a Delphi study.Sexual and reproductive health matters · 2025Article
- What About Well-Being? Measuring What We Really Care About in Sexual and Reproductive Health.Studies in family planning · 2025Article
- Agency in Family Planning: A Scoping Review of the Measurement of Agency in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.Studies in family planning · 2025Article
- Development and Validation of the Agency in Contraceptive Decisions Scale in Uganda and Nigeria.Studies in family planning · 2025Article
- Capturing the Dynamic Nature of Choice: Qualitative Perspectives on Contraceptive Acceptability from Cameroon and Kenya.Studies in family planning · 2025Article
- Index pregnancy emotional fertility intention and its correlates in Ethiopia: evidence from a national women and newborns baseline survey.Reproductive health · 2025Article
- The state of postpartum contraceptive use in India: descriptive lessons from nationally representative survey data.Reproductive health · 2025Article
- Contraceptive decision-making and its association with contraceptive use among married adolescent girls in Niger.Reproductive health · 2025Article
- Using the 5C Vaccine Hesitancy Framework to Elucidate and Measure Contraceptive Acceptability in sub-Saharan Africa.Global health, science and practice · 2024Article
- Attitudes toward sexual and reproductive health and rights and their associations with reproductive agency: a population-based cross-sectional study in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Zimbabwe.Sexual and reproductive health matters · 2024Article
- Women's involvement in decision-making and association with reproductive health behaviors: findings from a cross-sectional survey in Niger.BMC women's health · 2024Article
- Conceptualizing Contraceptive Agency: A Critical Step to Enable Human Rights-Based Family Planning Programs and Measurement.Global health, science and practice · 2024Article
- Women's voices and meanings of empowerment for reproductive decisions: a qualitative study in Mozambique.Reproductive health · 2024Article
- Agency in Contraceptive Decision-Making in Patient Care: a Psychometric Measure.Journal of general internal medicine · 2023Article
- Understanding the rise in traditional contraceptive methods use in Uttar Pradesh, India.Reproductive health · 2023Article
- Measuring women's agency in family planning: the conceptual and structural factors in the way.Sexual and reproductive health matters · 2022Article
- Associations between Contraceptive Decision-Making and Marital Contraceptive Communication and use in Rural Maharashtra, India.Studies in family planning · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
4 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Conceptual ambiguity in how we define reproductive empowerment has left the field with inconclusive evidence of its relationship to key reproductive outcomes. Our study aimed to develop and test a measure of reproductive decision-making agency, which is a critical component of reproductive empowerment, in a sample of married women from two Nepalese districts. Initial measures were developed based on theory and previous literature. Next, we used cognitive interviewing techniques to explore local meanings of reproductive empowerment and decision making through eight focus group discussions and 24 in-depth interviews. This process resulted in four core questions used to assess decision making across three domains of reproductive behavior: when to have children, whether to use family planning, and which family planning method to use. We combined these questions to develop an overall assessment of decision-making agency. These measures were included in a quantitative survey conducted with 1000 women, split evenly between the two districts. The combined measure of overall reproductive decision-making agency was internally consistent across the three domains examined (Cronbach's alpha = 0.6416), performed well across a range of validity assessments, including those aimed at assessing construct and criterion validity, and was predictive of a range of reproductive outcomes, particularly those related to feelings of reproductive control. The results suggest that the measures developed here provide insight into the nuances of joint versus sole decision making beyond those provided by standard measures. With better measures of reproductive agency, we can better design interventions for men and women, to meet their reproductive needs.
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.