Problem:

Why do developing countries have,in general, a lower age of first marriage for women in
comparison to more developed countries?

Literature Review:
http://www.popcouncil.org/pdfs/wp/202.pdf
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/2214896.pdf
http://www.forwarduk.org.uk/news/news/203
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11524&page=118

Hypothesis: Life expectancy directly relates to the age of first marriage for women. Since more
developed countries have higher life expectancies, this would explain the trend of more
developed countries having a higher age at first marriage.
Secondary Analysis:
http://www.gapminder.org/world/

Analysis:

Conclusion:

This report was written by researchers working for the Population Council which is an
international, non-profit, NGO which conducts research on reproductive health and
demographics. They analyzed previously collected data to try to explain the trends in the age of
first marriage in developing countries. They did not come to a definitive conclusion however they
found that both urbanization and increased education of women were found to be contributing
factors in the decrease of age of first marriage.

This article was written by two researchers working for the Guttmacher Institute which is another
non-profit organization which works to advance reproductive health. They conclude that female
labor force participation, women's acquisition of formal education and urbanization. are the three most
relevant factors when looking at trends in age at first marriage.

This article discusses marriage age in Uganda specifically. It again stresses the education of
women as a key factor. It also goes into more depth on the impacts of a low marriage age as
well as how the Ugandan government is working to raise the age of first marriage through laws
as well as emphasising education. This article also addresses the point that the age of
marriage, in this case being in the teen years, is a social norm that also plays a prominent role.


I used secondary analysis because this was really the only way I could make any relevant
conclusions because of the scale of the problem I was analyzing.

Due to the scale of the problem I was analyzing secondary analysis was really the only viable
option for research. I used data from many different sources when I looked for trends. Some of
these sources include Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, the World Bank and UNESCO
Institute for Statistics. The data from these sources had been compiled by Gapminder which I used to
visualize and analyze the different data sets.

access

After reading the literature on the topic I realized that my original hypothesis was most likely not
true. The life expectancy does correlate with the age at first marriage however correlation does
not imply causation and when looking at data over time it does not appear to be the causation.
My post-literature analysis hypothesis does appear to hold true. It is difficult to definitively
pinpoint what causes more developed countries to have a higher age at first marriage as there
are many statistical differences between developed and developing countries. The education of
women, based on their mean years in school, shows the strongest statistical correlation and
supports a logical conclusion. As women become more educated and work longer into their
adolescent years they are more likely to wait longer for marriage. They are also much more
likely to see having a career of their own as a possibility. Developed countries, in general, have
a higher mean years of schooling for women and this explains the difference in the age of first
marriage between developed and developing countries.