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Violent Conflict and Sexual Behavior in Rwanda
Author(s) -
Elveborg Lindskog Elina
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
population, space and place
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.398
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1544-8452
pISSN - 1544-8444
DOI - 10.1002/psp.1881
Subject(s) - sexual intercourse , context (archaeology) , genocide , psychology , hazard , sexual violence , social psychology , demography , criminology , political science , geography , sociology , population , chemistry , archaeology , organic chemistry , law
Early and premarital sexual intercourse can be linked to a host of problems in a sub‐Saharan African context including unwanted pregnancies and exposure to sexually transmitted infections. This study explores the relationship between violent conflict and premarital first sexual intercourse in Rwanda, a country that experienced violent conflicts leading up to the genocide in 1994, alongside high HIV prevalence. The study makes use of unique data on violent conflict at the regional level that are linked to the sexual histories of individual women across time and place. The study employs indirect and direct conflict indicators to estimate the risk of premarital first sexual intercourse. The method used was piece‐wise constant hazard models, which reveal an increased risk of premarital first sexual intercourse during the conflict years of 1993 and 1994. Both the indirect and the direct conflict indicators provided strong evidence of a conflict effect in Rwanda. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.