title: Gender preference and awareness regarding sex determination among antenatal mothers attending a medical college of eastern India.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  There are many women "missing" due to an unfavourable sex ratio in India, which has strong patriarchal norms and a preference for sons. Female gender discrimination has been reported in health care, nutrition, education, and resource allocation due to man-made norms, religious beliefs, and recently by ultrasonography resulting in lowered sex ratio.
  
  
  METHODS
  The present study attempts to find out the level of awareness regarding sex determination and to explore preference of gender and factors associated among antenatal mothers attending a medical college in eastern India. Interviews were done by predesigned pretested proforma over 6 months. The data were analysed by SPSS 16.0 software for proportions with chi-squared tests and binary logistic regression analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Most women who were multigravida did not know about contraceptives; 1.8% of mothers knew the sex of the fetus in present pregnancy while another 34.7% expressed willingness; 13.6% knew of a place which could tell sex of the fetus beforehand; 55.6% expressed their preference of sex of the baby for present pregnancy while 50.6% of their husbands had gender preference. Gender preference was significantly high in subjects with: lower socioeconomic status (p=0.011); lower level of education of mother (p=0.047) and husband (p=0.0001); multigravida (p=0.002); presence of living children (p=0.0001); and husband having preference of sex of baby (p=0.0001).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Parental education, socioeconomic background, and number of living issues were the main predictors for gender preference. Awareness regarding gender preference and related law and parental counselling to avoid gender preference with adoption of small family norm is recommended.
authors: NRS Medical College, West Bengal, India.
authors: Shamima
authors: S
authors: Yasmin
authors: Anindya
authors: A
authors: Mukherjee
authors: Nirmalya
authors: N
authors: Manna
authors: Baijayanti
authors: B
authors: Baur
authors: Mousumi
authors: M
authors: Datta
authors: Manabendra
authors: M
authors: Sau
authors: Manidipa
authors: M
authors: Roy
authors: Samir
authors: S
authors: Dasgupta
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D007194:India; D008297:Male; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011247:Pregnancy; D011295:Prenatal Care; D036301:Qualitative Research; D012577:Schools, Medical; D012732:Sex Determination Analysis; D012744:Sex Ratio; D063507:Sexism; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Abortion; Indian national census 2011; NFHS; PNDT act; deprivation; female feticide; gender discrimination; gender preference; sex determination; sex ratio