title: Ownership of dwelling affects the sex ratio at birth in Uganda.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Socio-economic conditions can affect the secondary sex ratio in humans. Mothers under good environmental conditions are predicted to increase the birth rates of sons according to the Trivers-Willard hypothesis (TWH). This study analyzed the effects of ownership and non-ownership of dwellings on the sex ratio at birth (SRB) on a Ugandan sample.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Our investigation included 438,640 mothers aged between 12 and 54 years. The overall average SRB was 0.5008. Mothers who live in owned dwellings gave increased births to sons (0.5019) compared to those who live in non-owned dwellings (0.458). Multivariate statistics revealed the strongest effects of dwelling ownership when controlling for demographic and social variables such as marital status, type of marriage, mothers' age, mothers' education, parity and others.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results are discussed in the framework of recent plausible models dealing with the adjustment of the sex ratio. We conclude that the aspect of dwelling status could represent an important socio-economic parameter in relation to SRB variations in humans if further studies are able to analyze it between different countries in a comparative way.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria. bernard.wallner@univie.ac.at
authors.forename: Bernard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Wallner
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fieder
authors.forename: Horst
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Seidler
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D006798:Housing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009035:Mothers / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010067:Ownership / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D036801:Parturition; D012744:Sex Ratio; D014454:Uganda; D055815:Young Adult