Abstract
Using data from a 1966–1967 probability sample of West Malaysian married women 15–44 years of age, this paper analyzes the characteristics of women who were active in diffusing information about family planning. The woman’s age and her parity, her educational attainment, her race, her present residence (urban-rural), and whether or not she wanted more children were significantly related to opinion leadership in bivariate tables. However, these relationships appeared to be substantial mainly because these social and demographic characteristics were highly related to whether the woman participated in discussions about family planning with other women. Among women who did participate in such discussions, the social and demographic variables were not substantially related to opinion leadership. In fact, the critical variables for opinion leadership appeared to be participation in the discussions, greater knowledge of family planning, and a higher level of family planning use. An attempt is also made to assess the effect of interpersonal communication on the adoption of family planning among women in the sample.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Andrews, Frank, James Morgan, and John Sonquist. 1967. Multiple Classification Analysis. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Institute for Social Research.
Ariffin bin Marzuki and James A. Palmore. 1970. A third year progress report on the West Malaysian family survey. In Proceedings of the Combined Conference of East Asian Population Programs and Evaluation of the Malaysian National Family Planning Program. Kuala Lumpur: National Family Planning Board of Malaysia (in press).
—, and J. Y. Pengo 1970. Malaysia. Country Profiles (July). New York: The Population Council and The International Institute for the Study of Human Reproduction, Columbia University.
Becker, Marshall. 1970. Sociometric location and innovativeness: reformulation and extension of the diffusion model. American Sociological Review 35:267–282. Berelson, Bernard, Paul Lazarsfeld, and William
McPhee. 1954. Voting: A Study of Opinion Formation in a Presidential Campaign. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Blau, Peter M. and Otis Dudley Duncan. 1967. The American Occupational Structure. New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc.
Cancian, Frank. 1967. Stratification and risktaking: a theory tested on agricultural innovation. American Sociological Review 32: 912–927.
Carter, Roy, Jr. and Peter Clarke. 1962. Public affairs opinion leadership among educational television viewers. American Sociological Review 27:792–799.
Cho, Lee-Jay, James A. Palmore, and Lyle Saunders. 1968. Recent fertility trends in West Malaysia. Demography 5:732–744.
Coleman, James, Elihu Katz, and Herbert Menzel. 1966. Medical Innovation: A Diffusion Study. New York: Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc.
DeFleur, Melvin L. and Otto N. Larsen. 1958. The Flow of Information: An Experiment in Mass Communication. New York: Harper and Brothers.
Dubey, Dinesh Chandra, and Harvey M. Choldin. 1967. Communication and diffusion of the IUCD: a case study in urban India. Demography 4:601–614.
Fallers, Lloyd. 1954. A note on the ’Trickle‘ effect. Public Opinion Quarterly 18:314–321.
Fawcett, J. T., Aree Somboonsuk, and Sumol Khaisang. 1966. Diffusion of Family Planning Information by Word of Mouth Communication. Chulalongkorn, Thailand: Family Planning Research Unit, Chulalongkorn University.
Fawcett, J. T. and Aree Somboonsuk. 1969. Thailand: using family planning-acceptors to recruit new cases. Studies in Family Planning 39:1–4.
Fliegel, Frederick C. and Joseph E. Kivlin. 1966. Attributes of innovations as factors in diffusion. American Journal of Sociology 72:235–248.
Goldberg, David and G. Litton. 1969. Family planning: observations and an interpretive scheme. In tTurkish Demography: Proceedings of a Conference. Ankara: Hacettepe University Publications No.7.
Hawley, Amos, Visid Prachuabmoh, and J. Y. Pengo 1965. Thailand: family growth in Protharam district. Studies in Family Planning 8:1–7.
Hill, R., J. Stycos, and K. Back. 1959. The Family and Population Control. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Katz, Elihu and Paul Lazarsfeld. 1955. Personal Influence: The Part Played by the People in the Flow of Mass Communications. New York: The Free Press of Glencoe.
Kennedy, David M. 1970. Birth Control in America: The Career of Margaret Sanger. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Kindermann, Charles R. 1969. Perception and Source of Information: Their Effect on Contraceptive Use in Taiwan. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Sociology, University of Michigan.
Kwon, E. Hyock. 1965. Sundong-Gu ActionResearch Project on Family Planning: A Progress Report (for Period 10 July–31 December, 1964). Seoul, Korea: School of Public Health, Seoul National University.
National Family Planning Board of Malaysia. 1968. Report on the West Malaysian Family Survey: 1966–1967. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia: National Family Planning Board of Malaysia.
Palmore, James A. and David M. Monsees. 1966. The Eastern Kentucky private physician-plus-education program: first evaluation of results. In Donald J. Bogue (ed.), the Rural South Fertility Experiments, Report No.1, Part II. Chicago: Community and Family Study Center.
Palmore, James A. 1967a. Hypotheses for family planning among the urban disadvantaged: U. S. A. In Proceedings of the World Population Conference, 1965. Vol. II. New York: United Nations.
— 1967b. The Chicago snowball: a study of the flow of influence and diffusion of family planning information. In Donald J. Bogue (ed.), Sociological Contributions to Family Planning Research. Chicago: Community and Family Study Center.
— 1968. Awareness sources and stages in the adoption of specific contraceptives. Demography 5:960–972.
— 1969. Malaysia: The West Malaysian family survey, 1966–1967. Studies in Family Planning 40:11–20.
Palmore, James A. and Ariffin bin Marzuki. 1969. Marriage patterns and cumulative fertility in West Malaysia, 1966–1967. Demography 6:383–401.
Palmore, James A. and R. Freedman. 1969. Perception of contraceptive practice by others; effects on acceptance. In R. Freedman and J. Y. Takeshita, Family Planning in Taiwan: An Experiment in Social Change. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Palmore, James A., Robert E. Klein, and Ariffin bin Marzuki. 1970. Differential participation in extended families: West Malaysia, 1966–1967. American Journal of Sociology 76:375–398.
Population Problems Research Council. 1968. Summary of Ninth National Survey of Family Planning. Tokyo: Population Problems Research Council, Mainichi Newspapers.
Rogers, Everett M. 1962. Diffusion of Innovations. New York: The Free Press of Glencoe.
— 1967. Bibliography on the Diffusion of Innovations. East Lansing, Michigan: Department of Communication, Michigan State University.
— 1968. Supplement to the Bibliography on the Diffusion of Innovations. East Lansing, Michigan: Department of Communication, Michigan State University.
— 1969. Modernization Among Peasants. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston.
Winick, Charles. 1961. The diffusion of an innovation among physicians in a large city. Sociometry 24:384–396.
Yang, Jae Mo, Sook Bang, Myung Ho Kim, and Man Gap Lee. 1965. Fertility and family planning in rural Korea. Population Studies 18:237–250.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Palmore, J.A., Hirsch, P.M. & bin Marzuki, A. Interpersonal communication and the diffusion of family planning in West Malaysia. Demography 8, 411–425 (1971). https://doi.org/10.2307/2060629
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/2060629