Table of Contents
Chapters
  1. Fertility Continues to Decline
  2. Contraceptive Use
  3. Contraceptive Method Mix
  4. Awareness and Availability of Contraception
  5. Other Direct Influences on Fertility
  6. Fertility Preferences
  7. Young Women
  8. Child Survival and Health
  9. Maternal Health
Highlights

Published by the INFO Project, Center for Communication Programs, The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, 111 Market Place, Suite 310, Baltimore, Maryland 21202, USA

Volume XXXI, Number 2,
Spring 2003
Series M, Number 17
Special Topics

Young Women

The DHS and RHS programs increasingly are surveying unmarried youth8 in addition to married couples. The great majority of survey data about unmarried young women in developing countries come from sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean.9 Few comparable surveys in other developing countries include unmarried women. Surveys in Eastern Europe and Central Asia include data for unmarried women as well as married women.

Such surveys since 1990 show that, in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, although the proportion of young women having premarital sex has changed very little, the average length of time between young women’s onset of sexual activity and marriage is increasing. In sub-Saharan Africa the gap is widening because women are marrying later. In Latin America and the Carib-bean women are starting to have sex at younger ages than in the past. Surveys also find that a growing percentage of sexually active unmarried young women are using contraception, especially condoms, which protect against both pregnancy and most sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV/AIDS.

Sexual Activity

Surveys ask women ages 15 to 24 whether they have ever had sex. Answers provide information about the proportion who have ever been exposed to the risks of pregnancy and STIs. Surveys also ask whether young women have been sexually active within four weeks before the survey (as an indication of whether they are currently sexually active).

Premarital sexual experience. Among adolescent women (ages 15 to 19), reported levels of premarital sexual experience are slightly higher in sub-Saharan Africa (29%) than in Latin America and the Caribbean (24%). Half or more of surveyed adolescent women in Belize, Gabon, Jamaica, and Togo report having sexual experience before marriage. In contrast, in the three Asian countries whose surveys include comparable data, levels of premarital intercourse among women ages 15 to 19 are negligible (see Table 9).

Among 30 developing countries with more than one survey since 1990, levels of adolescent premarital sexual experience remained about the same. Repeat surveys in Colombia and Paraguay reported increases of 18 and 12 points respectively. In contrast, levels in Ghana fell 19 points—nearly by half—between 1993 and 1998 (see Table 9).

As might be expected, unmarried women ages 20 to 24 are more likely than women ages 15 to 19 to be sexually experienced. In sub-Saharan Africa and in Latin America and the Caribbean, nearly half of surveyed women ages 20 to 24 report having had premarital intercourse. Levels reach nearly four of every five such women in Cape Verde and South Africa. In Latin America and the Carib-bean women ages 20 to 24 are two to three times more likely to have had premarital sex than women ages 15 to 19 in every country except Belize (see Table 9).

Young African mother holding her son.
Harvey Nelson
In many surveyed sub-Saharan countries, married women under the age of 20 have low levels of contraceptive use, at an average 13%. In this region sexually active unmarried women ages 15 to 19 are three times as likely as married women in the same age group to use contraception. Around the world, most young women become sexually active only after they marry or enter a union. Nevertheless, many become sexually active beforehand.

Among women ages 20 to 24, the percentage reporting premarital intercourse increased only slightly (an average of four points) in sub-Saharan Africa in the 16 countries with trend data since 1990. In Latin America and the Caribbean premarital sexual activity among women ages 20 to 24 increased about 8 percentage points during the 1990s, rising in all 13 surveyed countries except Jamaica (see Table 9).

Eastern Europe and Central Asia differ substantially in levels of premarital intercourse among young women. In Central Asia and the Caucasus the levels are negligible except in Kazakhstan. In Eastern Europe half of women ages 15 to 19 in the Czech Republic and half or more of women ages 20 to 24 in the Czech Republic, Romania, and Ukraine had sex before marriage (see Table 9).

Recent sexual activity among unmarried women. Few unmarried women ages 15 to 19 report recent sexual activity (that is, in the four weeks before being surveyed), according to data for 47 countries—11% in sub-Saharan Africa and 5% in Latin America and the Caribbean. Levels of recent sexual activity among adolescent women are highest in Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Gabon, and Togo, at between 20% and 25%. In contrast, the highest levels among unmarried adolescents in Latin America and the Caribbean are 10% in Brazil and Colombia, and 11% in Jamaica (see Table 9).

Recent sexual activity is considerably more common among unmarried women ages 20 to 24 than among younger unmarried women. The level averages 24% in sub-Saharan Africa and 12% in Latin America and the Caribbean.

While average regional levels of recent sexual activity among unmarried youth changed little since 1990, a few countries reported large changes. Levels of current sexual activity fell by one-half among adolescents in Ghana between 1993 and 1998. In Colombia the levels rose from 3% to 10% between 1990 and 2000 among unmarried adolescents and from 10% to 28% among the older group (see Table 9).

8 The terms “youth,” “adolescents,” and “young people” are defined variously. For example, WHO refers to people between the ages of 10 and 19 as adolescents and the larger age group 10 to 24 as young people. This issue of Population Reports uses the term “adolescents” for women ages 15 to 19, and “youth” or “young women” for those ages 15 to 24.
9 The standard DHS questionnaire covers all married and unmarried women ages 15 to 49 except where countries restrict coverage by age or marital status. The RHS program conducts the Young Adult Reproductive Health Surveys (YARHS) in countries that request such a survey. Also, a young adult module is part of the standard RHS, including unmarried women where requested.

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