Khadijeh Asadi Sarvestani; Suet Leng Khoo; Nor Malina Malek; Suziana Mat Yasin; Aliyar Ahmadi
Abstract
Background: Desired number of children is one of the main indexes showing the fertility preferences of couples. This issue is currently more important as Iranian policy makers are revising population policies to improve fertility rate.
Objectives: As a result, the main goal of this study was to investigate ...
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Background: Desired number of children is one of the main indexes showing the fertility preferences of couples. This issue is currently more important as Iranian policy makers are revising population policies to improve fertility rate.
Objectives: As a result, the main goal of this study was to investigate factors influencing the number of desired children among married women in the reproductive age. A theoretical framework was constructed based on demographic transition theory, demand-supply theory and diffusion theory.
Methods: This study was a quantitative research and its research technique was survey. The population of the study included all married women at the reproductive age (15-49), who were living in Shiraz County (Shiraz city and surrounding rural areas). Data was collected by interviews with 626 women, who were selected by multi cluster sampling and purposive sampling during year 2014. Data was analyzed by the SPSS (version 22) software.
Results: The findings showed that the desired number of children both in Shiraz city and its surrounding rural areas was exactly below the replacement rate. In addition, findings of this study demonstrated that the desired number of children as a dependent variable is affected by a set of socioeconomic and cultural factors. Results have revealed that the main predictors are couple agreement on the number of children, respondents’ income, son preference, respondents’ authority and ethnicity.
Conclusions: Overall, the variables considered in the research model explained only 32.7% of change in the dependent variable. This means that 67.3% of change in the number of desired children is related to factors that are not included in the research model. Moreover, most of the women in Shiraz County desired to have a small family size and this fact can result in further decline of fertility rates in the future because couples respect their desires in fertility. As a result, it is recommender for policy makers to pay more attention to factors influencing the desired number of children.
Aliyar Ahmadi
Abstract
Context: Social relations have been found to affect different aspects of people’s life. This article is a systematic review of attempts to consider the social support as a major determinant of health during life span.
Evidence Acquisition: For our research we retrieved data from the J Store, Springer, ...
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Context: Social relations have been found to affect different aspects of people’s life. This article is a systematic review of attempts to consider the social support as a major determinant of health during life span.
Evidence Acquisition: For our research we retrieved data from the J Store, Springer, Wiley Online Library, Elsevier, Science Direct, PubMed database as well-known sources of scientific studies. The study comprised all studies considering social ties and relationships and health outcomes of both genders in different aspects of medical sociology and social epidemiology, with particular emphasis on comprehensive studies to identify the implications of and the effect of social support on women’s health.
Results: The results obtained from this review are presented in three main sections. These include perceived versus received social support, main effect versus buffering effect of social support, and finally the consideration of women’s health. Overall, empirical studies confirm the importance of social relationship to health and longevity and its different implications in women’s health.
Conclusions: To be healthier and more usefully active in the society, women need to have different kinds of support from social relationships. Women are required to be better informed about the significance of enjoying positive social relationships which provide potential health benefits, by social support, from both relatives and other people.
Aliyar Ahmadi; Fatemeh Roosta
Abstract
Background: Health promotion is receiving an ever increasing attention regarding its prominent role in health of population. Health promoting lifestyle could be due, in some part, to enhancing knowledge about healthy behaviors.
Objectives: Due to the importance of healthy lifestyle in current situation ...
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Background: Health promotion is receiving an ever increasing attention regarding its prominent role in health of population. Health promoting lifestyle could be due, in some part, to enhancing knowledge about healthy behaviors.
Objectives: Due to the importance of healthy lifestyle in current situation of chronic diseases in Iranian society, the aim of this study was to determine the correlates of health promoting life style with a special emphasis on the role of health knowledge among women of reproductive age.
Patients and Methods: This cross-sectional study was carried out on a sample of 392 women of child bearing age (15 - 49 years) in 2013 in the city of Shiraz, southern Iran. The participants were selected through random cluster sampling. The scale for health promotion lifestyle was Walker’s Health Promoting lifestyle Profile (HPLP), which encompasses six healthy lifestyle dimensions including health self-responsibility, nutrition, physical activity, stress management, interpersonal relationships and spiritual growth.
Results: The results of the study indicated a significant association between health knowledge (r = 0.225, P = 0.000), rate of study in health matters (r = 0.341, P = 0.000), women’s education (r = 0.109, P = 0.035), husbands’ education (r = 0.182, P = 0.005), and socio-economic class (Spearman’ rho = 0.154, P = 0.000) and Health Promoting lifestyle (HPLS). In addition, age and education affected HPLS through health knowledge. There was no significant association between age, age at marriage, family size, marital status, experience of abortion and occupation with Health Promoting lifestyle.
Conclusions: Knowledge automatically creates the desired changes in behavior. Health professionals and health education programs have to increase awareness of healthy lifestyle behaviors that enables people to apply this knowledge in their everyday lives. Therefore, the goal of health policy should be promoting the health knowledge of the population.
