Influence of Early Marriage on the Health Status of Women in Rural Areas of Northern States of Nigeri

Abstract

 The study was carried out to investigate the influence of early marriage on the health status of women in rural areas of Northern States of Nigeria. Ex-post facto design was used for the study. The target population consisted of all the women that have been affected and exposed to early marriage in the Northern States of Nigeria out of which samples of 422 respondents were selected using a multi-stage sampling procedure. The instrument for the study was a selfdeveloped questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of r = 0.75. Mean and standard deviations were used to answer the research question while t-test was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 alpha level. The result showed that early marriage had significant influence (t = 0.21 and p < 0.05) on the health status of women in the rural areas of Northern States of Nigeria. It was concluded that early marriage negatively affects the health status of women in the rural areas of Northern States. It was also recommended that health educators and nongovernmental organizations should be involved in grass root family sensitization and orientation on the effects of early marriage on women’s health.