Tagged / autonomy

Paper on Nepal reaching 5,000 readers

international, open access, Publishing, Women's Academic Network, writing

Today ResearchGate informed us that our 2010 paper ‘Women’s autonomy in household decision-making: A demographic study in Nepal‘ [1] has been read 5,000 times.  This academic paper published in the international journal Reproductive Health is Open Access, hence available to anybody globally with internet access. The study explored the links between women’s household position in Nepal and their autonomy in decision making.  Using existing data (n = 8,257)  from the Nepal Demographic Health Survey (NDHS) 2006 we (Dr. Pramod Regmi and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen with colleagues from other UK universities) focused on four types of household decision making: (1) women’s own health care; (2) making major household purchases; (3) making purchase for daily household needs; and (4) visits to her family or relatives.

We found that women’s autonomy in decision making is positively associated with their age, employment and number of living children. Women from rural area and Terai region (the southern part of Nepal bordering India) have less autonomy in decision making in all four types of outcome measure. There is a mixed variation in women’s autonomy in the development region across all outcome measures. Western women are more likely to make decision in own health care (1.2-1.6), while they are less likely to purchase daily household needs (0.6-0.9). Women’s increased education is positively associated with autonomy in own health care decision making (p < 0.01), however their more schooling (school-leaving certificate and above) shows non-significance with other outcome measures. Interestingly, rich women are less likely to have autonomy to make decision in own healthcare.

 

Reference:

  1. Acharya, D.R., Bell, J.S., Simkhada, P., van Teijlingen, E., Regmi, P. (2010) Women’s autonomy in household decision-making: a demographic study in Nepal. Reproductive Health 7, 15   https://doi.org/10.1186/1742-4755-7-15

ERASMUS 2017: Promoting autonomy for people with dementia using ICT applications

The end of 2017 brought about the start of the second successful ERASMUS funded project for Dr Ben Hicks (psychology lecturer and member of ADRC) and Professor Wen Tang (Head of Creative Technology Department). Working alongside European partners from Slovenia (Alzheimer’s Slovenia), Greece (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki), Spain (Alzheimer’s Castellon and the University of Valencia) and Turkey (Alzheimer’s Turkey), the two year project aims to develop an e-platform that raises awareness and promotes the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to enhance the autonomy of people with dementia and their care partners.

The first meeting was held in Castellon, Spain, at the Universitat Jaume 1 on the 18-19th December 2017 and was attended by Ben and Natalia Adamczewska (ADRC). Over the course of two days, the proposed research plan and outcomes of the project were discussed in more detail and tasks were assigned to each of the European partners. This included establishing an Advisory Group of people with dementia, care partners and practitioners to inform the development of the project as well as conducting a review of best practice within this field.

Although it is only early days, there was a real buzz around the meeting, as the partners discussed the project and the potential beneficial impact it could have for people living with dementia across Europe. The second meeting for the project team is planned for April/May 2018.

If you would like further information on the research please contact Ben on bhicks@bournemouth.ac.uk