Exploring Socio cultural Barriers to Family planning adoption among women in Purba Bardhaman, West Bengal.

Abstract

The family planning is an important aspect of reproductive health, but its use is still subject to all sorts of socio-cultural factors especially in rural and semi-urban settings. The current research was done with the view of understanding the socio-cultural inhibitors on the uptake of family planning measures by women in Purba Bardhaman, West Bengal. The research was aimed at investigating awareness and knowledge, socio-cultural beliefs, gender and family dynamics, and socio-economic and accessibility issues concerning family planning behaviour. It used a descriptive and analytical research design and gathered primary data through 100 respondents consisting of women by a structured questionnaire on a 5-point Likert scale. Convenience sampling method was used and SPSS was used to analyse the data, descriptive statistics and independent samples t-test to test the differences between nuclear and joint family respondents. The results showed that women in nuclear families were much more aware, autonomous and had access to healthcare services, but women in joint families had more socio-cultural barriers, such as traditional norms, son preference, and impact of family members. The t-test results showed that there were statistically significant differences in all the significant factors (p < 0.05), which validated that family structure is a critical factor determining family planning adoption. The research came to the conclusion that even with the increased awareness, the socio-cultural norms and gender-based inequalities still make the proper usage of the family planning method difficult. Thus, it highlighted the importance of culturally sensitive interventions, greater role of family members and empowerment of women to improve acceptance and use of family planning services.