 Health, hygiene and maternal education: Evidence from The GambiaHazel Barrett and Angela Browne Social Science & Medicine, 1996, vol. 43, issue 11, 1579-1590 Abstract: The paper explores the ways in which women's education influences domestic hygiene practices and use of health care services in a traditional agricultural village in The Gambia. The "environment of health" is one of poverty, high morbidity and low levels of female literacy. A detailed household survey was undertaken in the rainy season when agricultural work is demanding of people's time and energy and morbidity rates are high. Mothers with and without formal education and with at least one child under 5 were included in the study. Small differences were found between the educated and uneducated group in the knowledge and practice of household hygiene. The healthcare services in the village were utilised by all women regardless of whether or not they had been to school, but educated mothers appeared to have a better understanding of health education messages. The case study illustrates the synergy between health, hygiene and maternal education and discusses the implications of the findings. Keywords: maternal; education; hygiene; health; care; apparent; knowledge.; The; Gambia (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:socmed:v:43:y:1996:i:11:p:1579-1590 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article Social Science & Medicine is currently edited by Ichiro (I.) Kawachi and S.V. (S.V.) Subramanian More articles in Social Science & Medicine from Elsevier |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.