Page 31 - IJPS-8-1

International Journal of

Population Studies

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Association between school dropouts, early

marriages, childbearing, and mental health in
early adulthood of women: Evidence from a

cohort study in Bihar, India

Ravita Yadav , Preeti Dhillon , Archana Kujur , and Sangram Kishor Patel *
1
2
3
4
1 International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India
2 Department of Survey Research and Data Analytics, International Institute for Population Sciences,
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
3 Department of Geography, Central University of Karnataka, Aland Road, Kalaburagi, Karnataka,
India
4 Poverty, Gender and Youth Program, Population Council, New Delhi, India

Abstract

School dropouts, early marriages, and low age at childbearing are issues still prevalent
in Indian states like Bihar, which may be responsible for poor mental health among
young adults. The present study examined the effect of life-course events such as
school dropouts, early marriages, and early childbearing on mental health status at
*Corresponding author: later ages (23–28 years). Using data from the Understanding the Lives of Adolescents
Sangram Kishor Patel and Young Adults consisting of a 2360 adolescent (ages 15 – 19) girl cohort interviewed
(sangramkishor@gmail.com) in 2007 and re-interviewed at ages 23 – 28 in 2016 from the state of Bihar, India, we
Citation: Yadav R, Dhillon P, applied ordinal logistic regression models in analyzing factors associated with mental
Kujur A, Patel SK. (2022). health status. Women who never attended school, or dropped out from school, and
Association between school who got married before age 19 showed a poorer mental health status in their young
dropouts, early marriages,
childbearing, and mental health adulthood (22 – 28 years) compared to their respective counterparts who attended
in early adulthood of women: a school and who got married at age 19 or older. As compared to women who had
Evidence from a cohort study in a child before age 19, those who did not have any child, or who had children after
Bihar, India. International Journal of
Population Studies, 8(1):25-37. 20 years of age were more likely to have poor mental health. Working women, high
https://doi.org/10.36922/ijps.v8i1.1280 self-efficacy of women, and women who have decision-making power showed better
Received: January 17, 2022 mental health outcomes as compared to their respective counterparts. To enhance
psychological well-being of young women, the study recommends continue education
Accepted: June 14, 2022
and delaying marriage as the programmatic keys with attention to improving young
Published Online: June 27, 2022 women’s autonomy and gender role attitudes and reducing societal pressure for
Copyright: © 2022 Author(s). bearing first child soon after marriage.
This is an Open-Access article
distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution Keywords: Mental health; Depression; School dropout; Early marriage; Early childbearing;
License, permitting distribution, Adolescents; Women empowerment; India
and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is
properly cited.
Publisher’s Note: AccScience
Publishing remains neutral with 1. Introduction
regard to jurisdictional claims in
published maps and institutional According to the World Health Organization, globally, 14% of adolescents (10 – 19)
affiliations. suffer from mental health conditions (WHO, 2021) and nearly 9.8 million young Indians

Volume 8 Issue 1 (2022) 25 https://doi.org/10.36922/ijps.v8i1.1280