University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2014 Reproductive Health Disparities in Latin America Emily Mae Vala-Haynes University of Pennsylvania,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Demography, Population, and Ecology Commons, and the Public Health Education and Promotion Commons Recommended Citation Vala-Haynes, Emily Mae, "Reproductive Health Disparities in Latin America" (2014). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 1479. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1479 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1479 For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Reproductive Health Disparities in Latin America Abstract Most countries in Latin America have completed or are approaching the completion of the fertility transition. Yet, the pace of the fertility decline in the region is characterized by vast inequalities. There are considerable cross-country and within-country differences, and women in lower socioeconomic strata continue to be more at risk of high adolescent and total fertility. This dissertation investigates reproductive health disparities in four Central American countries, Paraguay, and Argentina. Using Demographic and Reproductive Health Surveys, as well as a unique longitudinal dataset from Northern Argentina, I employ logistic regression, event history analysis, and logistic random effects techniques to examine the factors related to disparities in out-of-union childbearing, sexual behaviors in the transition to adulthood, and contraceptive use among indigenous women. I find that oungy age, residence in the capital region, and higher levels of religiosity and wealth are significantly related to out-of-union fertility in Paraguay. In Central America, age distributions for important events during the transition to adulthood have undergone little to no change over the past two decades.