dos.dos Difficulties with existing research
As the dowry is actually legally prohibited when you look at the India and you can Bangladesh, individuals constantly think twice to reveal accurate dowry numbers. The product quality question toward dowry throughout the Indian dataset asks in the community-based dowry. Instance, brand new Asia People Creativity Survey requires “Fundamentally in the region to have a family such as for instance a, do you know the version of points that are supplied because presents in the course of the newest daughter’s marriage?” A community-founded dowry is not necessarily the identical to just one dowry, that is paid down of the bride’s mothers during matrimony. Instead, practical question out of dowry allows merely a digital answer, we.age., regardless if an optimistic quantity of dowry is paid (e.grams., Questionnaire to your Condition of women and you will Virility both in Asia and you may Pakistan). A digital answer, definitely, doesn’t provide far more details. Standard of if a confident dowry matter emerges corresponds so you’re able to, which is mainly said by, ethnic, religious, and you may caste experiences for the Southern area Asia.
Since the dowry isn’t legitimately banned when you look at the Pakistan, the amount in person paid back because of the feminine respondent’s moms and dads will likely be asked as opposed to booking for the a good Pakistani dataset such as the Pakistan Rural House Questionnaire. Even in the event Pakistani interviewees might not purposefully conceal correct details about dowry techniques, the newest questionnaire may nonetheless include bear in mind errors because the participants need to remember the latest dowry count paid from the their moms and dads in the past. Figure 1a plots of land the new forecast amount of genuine dowry philosophy counted inside the Pakistani Rupees into the 2004 onto wedding seasons playing with studies out-of the newest Pakistan Rural House Survey. Because consensus is the fact real dowry number are expanding, or at least display a low-declining pattern, the new contour indicates the entire inclination from remember problems. Put differently, this new expanded the newest gap between the interviewees’ matrimony together with recall day, the more likely he’s so you’re able to overestimate the latest dowry amount.
Dating ranging from ladies’ ounts. The new line reveals the brand new predict actual number of dowry regressed on women’s marriage seasons. The fresh shady city suggests 95% depend on period of your own predicted quantity of dowry. The info resources of (a) and you will (b) is Pakistan Outlying Family Questionnaire 2004, additionally the outlying home questionnaire held from the blogger within the 2013, correspondingly
step 3 Research
On the best of all of our studies, studies gathered in this analysis could be the very first to adopt explicitly a standard tendency to overestimate a cost paid down lengthy ago. Much like the qualities of in the past collected data finn her, ours are also retrospective; not, predicated on which interest, i such as for example implemented particular services to reduce survey keep in mind mistakes. Such as, i requested the level of both community-depending dowry (non-retrospective) and personal dowry matter paid down in the course of the fresh new respondent’s relationships (retrospective). As the Pakistani dowry include gold/jewellery, dresses, furniture, kitchenware, and stuff like that, we queried dowry quantity because of the goods. If we thought a beneficial respondent’s overestimation of your own dowry count, particularly in the truth off a wedding you to took place good number of years ago, just like the dowry try displayed, we can and you can performed have a look at these types of wide variety which have people who attended the fresh new service. Thus, our very own research toward predicted actual quantities of dowry (Fig. 1b) do not inform you any decreasing trend, having said that having men and women claimed within the Fig. 1a.
3.1 Survey
When conducting our survey between , we intended to capture the heterogeneous aspects of the Punjab province in Pakistan. We divided Punjab (36 districts) into five regions: Pothohar (or North), Central, East, West, and South Punjab. Climate, culture (including marriage/inheritance practices), and socioeconomic conditions differ across regions but are similar within each region. We randomly selected one district from each region, namely, Rawalpindi, Mandi Bahauddin, Narowal, Muzaffargarh, and Bahawalnagar (Fig. 2). We used the district census for 1998–1999, the latest census available in Pakistan as of 2013, to randomly select six villages in rural areas in each of the five districts. We restricted sampling villages to those with a population of at least 1000 at the time of the census. In each village, we selected 22 households, following a stratified random sampling methodology. First, with assistance from the village chief, we made a list of households in the village and categorized them into a stratum. The strata are kammees Footnote 10 (i.e., traditional service or lower caste, with annual income ? PKR 200,000, > PKR 200,000) and zamindars (i.e., landowning farmers with land < 5,>12.5 acres). Eligible households in our survey are defined as those with an economically active husband and wife aged 15–65. Second, we performed stratified random sampling so that the share of each stratum in our sample corresponds to the share of each stratum of the village population (= households).