No evidence that polygynous marriage is a harmful cultural practice in northern Tanzania
No evidence that polygynous marriage is a harmful cultural practice in northern Tanzania
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DOI：
10.1073/pnas.1507151112
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发表时间：
2015-11-10
影响因子：
11.1
通讯作者：
Mulder, Monique Borgerhoff
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Lawson, David W.;James, Susan;Mulder, Monique Borgerhoff
一夫多妻制是跨文化的共同现象，是一个具有相当学术和政策意义的议题，往往被视为有害的文化习俗，有利于男子，不利于妇女和儿童。支持这一观点的是，对非洲国家人口调查的大规模研究一致表明，儿童健康状况不佳集中在一夫多妻制家庭。一夫多妻制与幸福之间在人口水平上的负相关也有报道，这与现代社会向一夫一妻制的过渡是由文化群体选择驱动的假设一致。我们挑战的共识，一夫多妻制是有害的，从56个不同种族的坦桑尼亚村庄的多层次数据。我们首先展示了生态和个人健康决定因素之间的混淆的汇总数据的脆弱性，而在整个村庄，一夫多妻制与儿童健康状况差和粮食安全低，这种关系是不存在的或逆转的村庄，特别是当孩子和父亲是共同居住。然后，我们提供的数据表明，共享丈夫的成本被一夫多妻制家庭的更多财富（土地和牲畜）所抵消。这些结果与基于女性选择的一夫多妻制模型一致。最后，我们表明，一夫多妻制的流行，粮食安全和儿童健康之间的乡村一级的负相关完全占潜在的差异，在生态脆弱性（降雨量）和社会经济边缘化（获得教育）。我们强调需要改进的，文化上敏感的测量工具和适当的分析尺度在一夫多妻制和其他据称有害的做法的研究，并讨论我们的研究结果的相关性，婚姻和当代人口政策的理论帐户。
Polygyny is cross-culturally common and a topic of considerable academic and policy interest, often deemed a harmful cultural practice serving the interests of men contrary to those of women and children. Supporting this view, large-scale studies of national African demographic surveys consistently demonstrate that poor child health outcomes are concentrated in polygynous households. Negative population-level associations between polygyny and well-being have also been reported, consistent with the hypothesis that modern transitions to socially imposed monogamy are driven by cultural group selection. We challenge the consensus view that polygyny is harmful, drawing on multilevel data from 56 ethnically diverse Tanzanian villages. We first demonstrate the vulnerability of aggregated data to confounding between ecological and individual determinants of health; while across villages polygyny is associated with poor child health and low food security, such relationships are absent or reversed within villages, particularly when children and fathers are coresident. We then provide data indicating that the costs of sharing a husband are offset by greater wealth (land and livestock) of polygynous households. These results are consistent with models of polygyny based on female choice. Finally, we show that village-level negative associations between polygyny prevalence, food security, and child health are fully accounted for by underlying differences in ecological vulnerability (rainfall) and socioeconomic marginalization (access to education). We highlight the need for improved, culturally sensitive measurement tools and appropriate scales of analysis in studies of polygyny and other purportedly harmful practices and discuss the relevance of our results to theoretical accounts of marriage and contemporary population policy.