Son Preference and Contraceptive Practice Among Tribal Groups in Rural South India

This paper examines the son preference and contraceptive practice among tribal groups in rural south India. Parents’ preferences for the sex of their children have constituted an important theme in population and social research over the past three decades. Data were collected from a household survey of 398 currently married women of reproductive age group (15-49) from four taluks in the Nilgiris District of rural Tamilnadu are selected with respect to the different tribal communities. Cross tabulation and logistic regression analysis was carried out for finding out relationships between the socio-economic, demographic variables on contraceptive practice. The use of contraceptive practice by tribal groups in rural areas is strongly linked to individual and household socio-economic and demographic variables. Findings shows that the expectation that a son will provide financial support in old age is strongly associated with the response that a son is important. Son preference is slightly more among the tribal women, particularly among the users of spacing method who are more among those preferring the sons. Some of the socio-economic variables like education of husband and occupation have shown negative influence on higher fertility and positive influence on contraceptive use among the tribal women. It is proposed that there is need for more comprehensive on tribes in different areas in state and in the Indian nation to explicitly bring out the son preference attitudes of tribal people, which have an impact on their fertility and family planning practices. A. SATHIYA SUSUMAN 32 pucca houses to them as early as possible. As the social participation is low, suitable steps should be taken to increase their participation in public bodies and institutions (Gurusamy, 1988). Fertility differentials, child mortality and family planning practices between two tribal groups in Luknow, India, a majority of the tribal groups 87 per cent and 67 per cent were living in joint family units; two-third of the tribal women were without schooling and the extent of indebtedness was high among both groups. Lower mean age at marriage among the wives of the two groups. Lower mean age at first birth, an average women gave a higher fertility level children and a higher ideal family size (Saxena, 1982). The acceptance and practice of family planning by the eligible couples depends to a very large extent on their awareness and knowledge regarding family planning methods, availability of services and favorable attitude towards family planning practices (Gurumurthy, 1986; Karkal Pause, 1979; Nag, 1991). The validity of the concept those tribes had a higher birth rate than the general population and the socio-cultural factors were responsible for the higher fertility among tribes. Two indicators of sex preference were used in the study such as the ideal number of sons and ideal number of daughters in a family. More balanced view concerning the ideal number of sons and daughters among the tribal women. The women do not have any special preference for either boys or girls (Repetto, 1972). The tribal society does not suffer from the compulsion to get married and have children, preferably a son. The tribal neither believe in rebirth nor believe in the theory of transmigration of soul. A number of studies in India showed that parents like to depend on their sons for old age security than their daughters. The cost of bringing up children up to age 15 does not seem to vary much between sons and daughters. However, the expectations from sons appeared to be more as compared to the daughters. The review of related literature leads us to conclude that the theoretical explanations advanced for some expected relationship between level of development socio-economic and cultural and value of children are sound . But the empirical relationship obtained in various setting always does not support the expected relationships. It is more so in the case of individual characteristics of the parents and value of children. The differentials in the (fertility differentials) level are due to differentials in the value of sons and daughters child, which are likely to be different under Indian context (Kuriyan, 1982; Sarma et al., 1974). Both the boys and girls were perceived as contributing rather differently to these basic values. Respondents of both sexes perceived boys contribute to the satisfaction of a greater number of values and needs than girls. Financial security, being accepted by others, having a happy home, personal achievement and carrying on the family name were all values that respondents associated more with boys than with girls (Sathiya Susuman, 2000). The patterns observed, however, are by no means uniform throughout India and they can be expected to continue to decline. The preference for sons that has been observed to varying degrees in every part of India has been showed to have an adverse effect on both fertility behavior and sex differentials in child mortality (Krishnamoorthy, 1974). The desire for sons discourages some couples from discontinuing childbearing after reaching their desired number of children because they have not yet had their minimum desired number of sons (Vlassoff et al., 1980). Tribal communities of various countries and societies are using contraception for limit their family size. While the same, couples has been desired more number of children, irrespective of the sex. Most of the tribal couples want at least on son for various reasons. This might be traditional or cultural system. When couples have achieved desired number of sex particularly sons, they adopt sterilization from government hospital or health centre or other temporary methods or usually tribal women are using herbal medicine or home made contraception (Sathiya Susuman, 2000). It is necessary to study the son preference and contraceptive practice among rural south Indian tribal groups. The major aim of the study is to examine the son preference and contraceptive practice among various groups of tribal communities, it is important that we consider with under developed community groups. To this study, the tribal women were compared with respect to their influence of socio-economic and demographic variables on son preference and contraceptive practice in rural areas.