EARLY MARRIAGE AMONG WOMEN IN DEVELOPING-COUNTRIES

A study using data from 40 Demographic and Health Surveys shows that a substantial proportion of women in developing countries continue to m arry as adolescents. Overall, 20-50% of women marry or enter a union b y age 18, and 40-70% do so by their 20th birthday. Early marriage is m ost prevalent in Sub-Saharan Africa and in South Asia, and least commo n in North Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Women aged 20-2 4 are less likely to have married by age 20 than are women aged 40-44, the differential is at least 10 percentage points in most countries a nd reaches 30-40 percentage points in some countries. Education and ag e at first marriage are strongly associated both at the individual lev el and at the societal level: A woman who has attended secondary schoo l is considerably less likely to marry during adolescence, and in coun tries with a higher proportion of women with a secondary education, th e proportion of women who marry as adolescents is lower.