Insight into Gender and Women's Empowerment through the DHS

Women's status, empowerment, and experiences of gender roles can now be measured in more depth through the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS). Historically, DHS surveys have provided information on fertility, women's and men's knowledge and use of family planning, maternal and child mortality, nutrition, health and health care, and HIV/AIDS, as well as household socioeconomic status. Enhancements to the DHS woman's and men's questionnaires and special modules permit the measurement of women's empowerment, levels of domestic violence, and female genital cutting.

Today DHS data provide an in-depth look at the life courses of women and men (for example, when they first have sex, marry, and have their first child, whether they work, and whether they control income and household decisions); at gender differentials in education and in children's health and health care; and at women's experience of various forms of gender-based violence.

The 1994 International Conference on Population and Development focused sharp attention on accounting for gender roles, needs, and relations when designing policies and programs that address population, health and nutrition issues. The HIV/AIDS epidemic has also highlighted the need to understand how gender inequalities in power, access, and resources affect the spread of infection.

DHS conducts program-relevant qualitative, as well as quantitative, research in the area of gender. Qualitative research provides a flexible way to examine how the gender context affects outcomes such as women's disclosure of their HIV status or women's use of contraception. It is also effective in studying other sensitive gender issues, such as female genital cutting (FGC). For example, qualitative methods were used in a study of FGC in Guinea. Women were interviewed about their social preparation for adulthood, including their FGC experience. Researchers also facilitated discussions between men and women on the topic of FGC. The qualitative interviews revealed different terms for FGC that would not have been captured through typical survey methods.

DHS also offers gender training that can be geared to a particular health or demographic outcome of interest (such as HIV/AIDS); to a particular country context; or to meet other specific topics or organizational needs. A three and a half-day workshop held in Kathmandu focused on constructing gender indicators from the Nepal DHS to help integrate gender in the design and implementation of the USAID mission's country-specific strategic objectives and programs. A more intensive three-week, multi-country workshop at DHS headquarters in Calverton, Maryland explored how gender affects various population, health, and nutrition outcomes, including fertility and family planning, maternal and child nutrition, and HIV/AIDS, in a variety of countries.

DHS gender workshops emphasize hands-on use of demographic and health data to build users' capacity to conduct gender analysis and to integrate gender into interventions, policies, programs, and research. Participants leave with a deeper understanding of the importance of gender equity and why attention to gender enhances the ability to achieve specific development, health or demographic goals.