The Relationship between Cell Phone Use and Family Planning: A Multi-Country Longitudinal Study

Philip Anglewicz, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Carolina Cardona, Johns Hopkins University
Apoorva Jadhav, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)
Suzanne Bell, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Caroline Moreau, INSERM/INED and Johns Hopkins School of Public Health

Cell phones may have a transformative impact on a range of health and development outcomes in low- and middle-income settings, yet little is known about the effect of cell phone ownership on these outcomes- such as those related to fertility and family planning. This is primarily due to limitations of study designs: the existing studies are nearly all cross-sectional, and many have small sample sizes and limited geographic scope. In this research, we use longitudinal panel data from eight countries to identify the effect of cell phone use on fertility and family planning outcomes. These data permit us to address some of the prominent limitation of previous studies: by using representative data (national and/or subnational), we expand on the scope of many previous studies; and the longitudinal panel design permits us to adjust for the way in which women who own phones may be different from those who don’t in unobserved characteristics. We also conduct this study in a variety of settings that differ in fertility and family planning profiles to examine whether and how the impact of cell phones may be context specific.

Keywords: Families, Unions and Households, Family Planning and Contraception, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, Population and Development

See extended abstract.