Power vs Money: Alternative Approaches to Reducing Child Marriage in Bangladesh, a Randomized Control Trial

A clustered randomized trial in Bangladesh examines alternative strategies to reduce child marriage and teenage childbearing and increase girl's education. Communities were randomized into three treatment and one control group in a 2:1:1:2 ratio. From 2008, girls in treatment communities received either i) a six-month empowerment program, ii) a financial incentive to delay marriage, or iii) empowerment plus incentive. Data from 15,739 girls 4.5 years after program completion show that girls eligible for the incentive for at least two years were less likely to be married under 18, less likely to have given birth under 20, and more likely to be in school at age 22. Unlike other incentive programs that are conditional on girls staying in school, an incentive conditional on marriage alone has the potential to benefit out-of-school girls. We find insignificantly different effects for girls in and out of school at baseline. The empowerment program did not decrease child marriage or teenage childbearing. However, girls eligible for the empowerment program were more likely to be in-school.本研究在孟加拉国开展整群随机试验（clustered randomized trial），旨在评估降低童婚、少女妊娠发生率并提升女童受教育水平的多种替代策略。研究将社区按照2:1:1:2的比例随机分为3个干预组与1个对照组。自2008年起，干预社区中的女童可获得以下三类支持之一：i）为期六个月的赋权项目；ii）用于延缓婚龄的经济激励；iii）赋权项目与经济激励相结合的方案。 项目结束4.5年后，针对15739名女童的追踪数据显示，至少连续两年有资格领取该激励的女童，其18岁前结婚的概率更低、20岁前生育的概率更低，且在22岁时仍在校就读的概率更高。与其他要求女童持续在校就读的激励项目不同，仅以延缓婚龄为条件的激励政策，有望惠及失学女童。 我们发现，在基线调研时已在校与失学的女童，其干预效果并无显著差异。单独的赋权项目并未降低童婚与少女妊娠的发生率，但有资格参与该赋权项目的女童，其在校就读的概率显著更高。