Are boys still short? : a study on sex differences in stunting prevalence over socio-economic status among children in Sub-Saharan Africa

2018

Background: Over 150 million children worldwide are stunted. In Sub-Saharan Africa alone

more than 1 in every 3 children is stunted due to insufficient food intake, boys being the most

vulnerable according to prior research. Although UN has accentuated the negative impact of

stunting and included it as part of the Sustainable Development Goal #2 ―End hunger‖, the

decline in stunting prevalence is slow partly due to the poverty trap cycle of stunting. The

economic costs of stunting are considerable as it precludes economic growth, which is especially

damaging for developing countries where stunting prevalence is substantial, resulting in

reinforcement of inequality.

Objective: The aim of this thesis is to explore possible determinants of nutritional status and

examine if the main significant variables identified can explain the gender gap of stunting

prevalence, both current status and development over time, in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Method: Student t-test and multiple logistic regression were employed to test for determinants of

nutritional status, the existence of sex differences in stunting and how that differed controlling for

socio-economic status proxied by several independent variables. Demographic and Health

surveys from 35 Sub-Saharan African countries conducted between 1986 and 2016 provided data

for the analysis.

Results: The pooled results display that boys are 1.18 times more likely to become stunted than

girls. Country specific results confirms the gender difference is in 33 of 35 countries (OR > 1,

95% CI) indicating a higher risk for boys. We found that wealth, mother’s education, polygamous

households, mother’s age at first birth are important factors in determining children’s nutritional

status. Although the observed determinants have significant impact, none of the tested variables

can explain the gender gap in stunting prevalence.

Conclusion: Our study confirms the gender gap indicated by smaller scale studies and hereby sets

an updated benchmark for the region. The study did not find that the exposed moderating factors

are playing a significant role in explaining the gender difference in stunting prevalence. Future

research should therefore focus on investigating new potential explanations for the gender gap.