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Exploring the relationship between socioeconomic status and teenage pregnancy in India: a review on National Family Health Survey

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Abstract

Despite India’s remarkable economic progress, teenage pregnancy continues to pose significant public health challenges, with adverse implications for both maternal and child health outcomes. Socioeconomic inequalities play a crucial role in shaping the landscape of teenage pregnancy, given India’s diverse demographic and regional disparities in education, healthcare access, and women’s empowerment. This study aims to address a notable gap in the existing literature by assessing the extent of inequality in teenage pregnancy in India, focusing on socioeconomic determinants often overlooked in previous research. The study employed a descriptive cross-sectional design, utilizing data from the third (NFHS-3 (2005–06)) and fifth (NFHS-5 (2019–21)) rounds of the Indian National Family Health Survey (NFHS). Concentration curves and decomposition methods were employed to analyze the data, allowing for an evaluation of the degree of inequality based on various socioeconomic and demographic characteristics of the sample. The analysis revealed significant disparities in adolescent pregnancy rates, particularly evident in rural-urban divides and disparities between socio-economic strata. Factors such as wealth quintiles, educational attainment, and exposure to mass media emerged as key contributors to the widening gap between disadvantaged and affluent populations. Our findings underscore the urgent need for a comprehensive policy approach to address the dual challenge of reducing teenage pregnancies and mitigating socioeconomic inequalities. Such an approach should incorporate cultural and health-promoting components to effectively tackle the underlying determinants of teenage pregnancy and promote equitable maternal and child health outcomes in India.

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Data availability

The data set used in this study available in the public domain https://dhsprogram.com/data/dataset/India_Standard-DHS_2020.cfm?flag=1.

Abbreviations

CC:

Concentration curves

NFHS:

National Family Health Survey

WHO:

World Health Organization

SC:

Scheduled caste

ST:

Scheduled tribe

OBC:

Other backward caste

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) program for providing free access to the original data used in this study.

Funding

This research received no specific grants from any funding agency, commercial entity, or not-for-profit organization.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Population and Development, International Institute of Population Sciences (IIPS), Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

    Milan Das

  2. Department of Family and Generations, International Institute of Population Sciences (IIPS), Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

    Abhishek Anand & Papai Barman

  3. Department of Economics and Finance, The Business School, RMIT International University Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City, 700000, Vietnam

    Deepak Kumar Behera

Authors
  1. Milan Das
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  2. Abhishek Anand
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  3. Papai Barman
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  4. Deepak Kumar Behera
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Contributions

M.D.: Conceptualization; Formal analysis; Investigation; Methodology; Supervision; Writing—original draft; Writing—review and editing. A.A.: Conceptualization; Writing—review and editing. P.B.: Writing—original draft; Writing—review and editing. D.K.B.: Writing—original draft; Writing—review and editing. All authors read and approved the final version of manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Abhishek Anand.

Ethics declarations

Ethical approval

This study utilized the NFHS-3 and NFHS-5, publicly available datasets with no identifiable information on the survey participants. These datasets can be downloaded from the Demographic and Health Surveys website. Ethical approval for the original study was obtained from the IIPS Ethical Review Board. Additionally, the ICF International Review Board (IRB) looked over the survey and gave ethical approval.

Informed consent

The respondents provided signed consent after being fully informed about the survey’s purpose and procedures.

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Not applicable.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interests.

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Das, M., Anand, A., Barman, P. et al. Exploring the relationship between socioeconomic status and teenage pregnancy in India: a review on National Family Health Survey. SN Soc Sci 4, 89 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43545-024-00889-7

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