Determining The Factors Influencing Fertility; A Meta Analytical View of Some Developing Countries

Fertility of human population is measured on the basis of number of children
ever born. High fertility can be a burden for countries with limited resources
on the contrary low fertility if below replacement level is a threat to future existence of a nation. In this study, we considered multiple demographic and health
survey data and investigated possible factors that could affect the fertility performance. Analysis was divided in three parts: logistic regression for BDHS data
alone, meta-analysis and subgroup analysis for 16 DHS data. We found that
for Bangladesh age, education, partner’s education, type of place of residence,
wealth index and age at first marriage has significant influence on high fertility.
Fertility performance is highly explained with the age of women, indicating that
increase in age leads to fertility rise. Education is one the most important factor
for explaining fertility, those have received higher education are 0.257 times or
74.3% less likely to contribute in high fertility compared to up to primary education. Additionally to explain fertility, Asian countries are mostly influenced by
the factors wealth index, type of place of residence and Body Mass Index. And
Non-Asian countries are mostly effected by women’s age, women’s education,
partner’s education and age at first marriage. Furthermore, per capita health
expenditure can significantly influence the fertility performance of a country. In
fact for several variables: women’s age, women’s education, partner’s education,
age at first marriage and body mass index it reduces the odds of high fertility.
Higher annual population growth of a country leads to high fertility for variables
wealth index and type of place of residence.

• Supervision