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Between 1965 and 1973 the percentage of married women practicing contraception in the United States increased from 64.2 to 69.9. This increase was accompanied by changing social values, increased information, and important technological innovations. The major technological innovations were the birth control pill and the Intrauterine Device (IUD), as well as new and safer techniques for female sterilization. The blossoming of private and public family planning programs in this period may also have been instrumental in the increased use of contraception.

The purpose of this paper is to obtain empirical evidence on the impacts of socio-economic and demographic factors on the fertility decisions taken by a common family in developing countries like Pakistan. Also, this study contravenes the conventional orthodoxy of childbirth decisions of a family by enlarging the canvas and conjectures the fundamental nexus amongst female’s education, fertility and contraceptive use.

The study is based on micro-level data, obtained from the Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey (2012-2013) which is the third survey carried out in Pakistan. Demographic and socio-economic profiles of 13,558 ever-married women, aged 15-49 years, were randomly selected from Gilgit Baltistan and the four provinces of Pakistan. Three dependent variables are used in empirical analysis i.e. current use of contraceptives, total fertility and cumulative fertility. In order to estimate the probability of contraceptive use maximum likelihood, Probit technique is employed with ordinary least squares on reduced form specifications of total fertility and cumulative fertility models.

The empirical results proved the hypotheses that educated females practice more family planning through modern contraceptives which leads to a decrease in total fertility rates. Some significant links among females’ education, contraceptive use and fertility define the quantity – quality trade-off and opportunity cost of time. Evidently, female education provides maturity and awareness of family size which is necessary to take crucial economic decisions.

The empirical evidence suggests that maximum efforts should be made toward women’s education. The current standard of education in Pakistan is not enough to overcome the long-standing problem of excessive child birth. This could be done with the help of public – private partnership as the measures taken by the government alone are insufficient. The government should initiate some adequate measures such as education and awareness about contraceptive usage at the secondary school level that could be a vivacious step to support fertility reduction.

The framework used in this study provides a broader intra-household income–expenditure approach. With a smaller family size, the household’s income would be shared among fewer individuals. It is highly probable that parents would be more attentive if they need to look after a few children. That is the best way to progress their children with limited resources.

From the socioeconomic perspectives, educated parents plan the ideal family size which allows them to spend more on their children’s upbringing.

This study captures the magnitude of fertility decisions with the relevance of the wife’s education because the present practice in Pakistan does not allow higher education for married women. This is why this study could be used as a benchmark for further study in the same area.

The paper reports on developments in the Information Seeking and Communication Model (ISCM) since it was first presented in 2013, focussing on how the model, derived by explicitly drawing on previous models, frameworks, and concepts, has been applied, adapted and extended. This paper summarises the reception of the ISCM, and describes two new applications in different contexts.

A literature review details applications of, comments on and critiques of, the ISCM since its introduction. Two exploratory studies of health information seeking behaviour show the application of the ISCM in novel contexts.

The literature cited here, and the two studies outlined show the applicability and extendibility of the ISCM, as well as its value in helping to capture the holistic context of information seeking, the interplay between providers and seekers of information, including fluidity of provider/seeker roles, and emotional dimensions of information seeking and use.

The paper responds to the call by Case and Given (2016) for further empirical testing of the ISCM and similar conceptual models. It shows the range of applicability of this model, and models drawn from it, and makes recommendations for further development.

Sterilisation in India (and globally) has a contentious and deeply politicised history. Despite this troubling legacy, India continues to rely on female sterilisation as the main form of contraception and family planning. Abortion, which has been legal under broad grounds since 1971, intersects with sterilisation at different points over women's reproductive lifecourse. Drawing on three case studies exploring women's abortion trajectories in Karnataka, India (2017), this chapter examines sterilisation as a reproductive technology (RT) in women's abortion narratives. These include experiences of failed sterilisation necessitating abortion, as well as narratives around pre- and post-abortion counselling with sterilisation conditionalities. Women report healthcare workers shaming or scolding them for not being sterilised after their last pregnancy – demonstrating the prominence of sterilisation as an enforced social norm using ‘health’ frames. Using reproductive justice (RJ) as a lens, I analyse how sterilisation interacts with abortion and the narratives of shame and stigma that surround the two technologies and make visible the ways in which it results in the denial and restriction of women's reproductive freedoms.

Men are often considered by the health care system to be a disengaged accessory when it comes to family planning. In reality they act as an equal part in the reproductive equation. Despite qualitative research suggesting some men currently do take primary responsibility for family planning, men are further marginalised being classed as an irrational variable in large national datasets. Reports ignore men in general by failing to record basic demographics, for example, age is not captured and ethnicity has two options: white and non-white. This leaves little ability to analyse men's family planning knowledge, attitudes and beliefs. Technological advancements have resulted in new forms of male contraceptive methods reaching phase III testing (from pills to gels), and the market is moving towards diversified options that will allow even more men to take primary contraceptive responsibility. Other advancements include the sexual enhancement product Viagra becoming available over the counter, and reproductive wellbeing apps have been created to allow men to test their fertility at home. Without research to understand the ever-changing landscape for men we are ill-prepared to understand what these new products and advancements mean for men's role. Using various forms of publicly available online data and previous empirical research, this chapter will review men's response to new contraceptives, sexual enhancement products, and reproductive wellbeing apps. The results will be discussed in relation to updating the Subjective Expected Utility (SEU) Theory, the Theory of Planned Behaviour and the integrated developmental and decision-making contraceptive models used by health psychologists.

I begin my historical analysis of the co-evolution of reproductive norms and desires, approaches to fertility control, and the meaning assigned to contraceptives with an examination of the Grafenberg Ring, the first modern IUD. The Grafenberg ring, developed in the late 1920s by a German doctor, Ernst Gräfenberg, was a small ring made of silkworm gut and coiled silver that can be compressed to be inserted into the uterus. The Grafenberg ring appeared at a time when changes in social attitude towards sexuality had formed a favorable climate for a new contraceptive method. The device was greeted with much interest from the European birth control movement, and Gräfenberg was invited to speak at the Third Congress of the World League for Sexual Reform held in London in 1929 and at the Seventh International Birth Control Conference in Zurich in 1930 (Davis, 1971).

In response to rising prevalence of sexually transmitted infection (STI) among teenagers, this study was designed to examine teenage perceptions of sex education, access to services, and attitudes relevant to STI.

A focus group study was conducted in three schools to discuss the sexual health needs of teenagers. Four single sex groups of 14‐15 year olds (two male and two female) comprising six to nine participants met for two one‐hour sessions. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and analysed by two researchers.

Sex education was reported to vary considerably in quality and content both between and within schools. Participants felt that this was due to some teachers being embarrassed, resulting in didactic delivery and lack of discussion. Most participants had received very little information about STI, including how it could be avoided or what to do if infection was suspected. Many felt that it would be useful to have an organised visit to a sexual health/contraceptive clinic as part of the curriculum and that it would also be helpful if clinic staff contributed to their sex education.

Teachers selected participants based on their maturity and willingness to take part, which may have resulted in failure to include those in greatest need of sexual health services.

Teenagers need more comprehensive sex education at an earlier age, delivered by individuals who are expert in the subject and comfortable in its delivery. Information alone is not enough but should be linked to accessible user‐friendly services for contraception and general sexual health.

This paper provides information on teenage sexual health needs in general and to the field of STI in particular.

The purpose of this paper is to describe divergent recent developments in provision of reproductive health services to North Americans.

Narrative review.

Two North American countries with very different histories present similar governance challenges today. The challenge is to provide all women with the full range of reproductive health options to which they are legally entitled now. In Canada, those contraception and abortion options are covered under the medical service plan insurance but not always available in convenient locations. In USA, those options are not uniformly covered under health insurance plans due to statutory limitations. In Canada, where federal law limiting abortion was struck down as unconstitutional, the leader of one of its three major federal political parties sees the way forward being to limit his party to pro-choice candidates. In USA, where new laws limiting abortion have been introduced at an unprecedented rate, the judiciary is being asked to define the way forward.

Clinical governance needs to balance the moral beliefs of individual providers against the rights of patients to have their lawful choices available within reasonable convenience. Progress has been made but needs are still not adequately met, in these North American examples.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors influencing the use of family planning and its link with multidimensional poverty in rural Nigeria.

The Alkire and Foster measure of poverty as well as the Logistic and Probit models were used to identify the factors influencing the use of family planning and its effect on the multidimensional poverty status of rural households in Nigeria.

The results indicate that 31.1 percent of rural households were poor with deprivations in health and education contributing the most to multidimensional poverty. The low use of contraception was closely linked to low level of literacy, lack of awareness of the different methods and high levels of poverty. The use of contraception reduced the level of poverty in the household.

The intensity of poverty should be considered in the design of policies and programs. The wide and proper use of family planning is a sine qua non for any significant reduction in poverty. Potent and assertive family planning programs by government could be achieved through public-private sector partnership and assistance of international development partners.

This paper attempts to bridge the knowledge gap in the empirical literature on the link between multidimensional poverty and family planning. In particular`, its application to the rural context, often characterized by high rate of poverty and unmet needs for family planning employing nationally representative data is of immense value for social policy.