DIRECT AND JUDGMENTAL MEASURES OF FAMILY-PLANNING PROGRAM INPUTS

This report compares two different approaches to measuring the strengt h of family planning programs in Bangladesh and Kenya. The first appro ach, the judgmental approach, has been used in a number of studies dur ing the past two decades; scores on the characteristics of family plan ning programs are derived from the responses knowledgeable persons giv e to a series of questions. The second approach is to obtain direct me asures of each item being considered. In Bangladesh, the total score v aried trivially between the direct and the judgmental approaches. In K enya, the total direct score was substantially higher than the judgmen tal score. The primary advantage of the judgmental approach is that co mparative scores can be obtained for a larger number of countries for the same time period at a much lower cost than would be required by th e direct approach.