Associations between early marriage and young women’s marital and reproductive health outcomes: Evidence from India

The study compares marital, reproductive and other outcomes between young women living in five Indian states who married before 18 and those who married later.

It finds that young women who had married at age 18 or older were more likely than those who had married before age 18 to have been involved in planning their marriage, to reject wife beating, to have used contraceptives to delay their first pregnancy and to have had their first birth in a health facility.

They were less likely than women who had married early to have experienced physical violence or sexual violence in their marriage or to have had a miscarriage or stillbirth.