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RESPONDENT’S CHARACTERISTICS
AND STATUS
3
The objective of this chapter is to provide a demographic and socioeconomic profile of the 2000
Ethiopia DHS sample. Information on the basic characteristics of women and men interviewed in the
survey is essential for the interpretation of findings presented later in the report and can provide an
approximate indication of the representativeness of the survey.
3.1 BACKGROUND CHARACTERISTICS OF RESPONDENTS
The distribution of women age 15-49 and men age 15-59 by background characteristics including
age, marital status, place of residence, region, educational level, and religion is shown in Table 3.1.
Relatively high proportions of women are in the younger age groups, with three-fifths under age
30. The proportion of women and men declines with age. This is true for men as well, with the
proportion of men declining after age 44. Despite the older average age of males interviewed, a larger
percentage of male respondents (40 percent) reported never having been married, compared with female
respondents (24 percent). The majority of respondents (more than 80 percent) live in the rural areas.
Two in five respondents live in the Oromiya Region, one in four in the Amhara Region, and one in five
in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples (SNNP) Region.
Men are more educated than women. Three in four women and one in two men have never been
to school. Sixteen percent of women and 33 percent of men had attended only primary education, and
9 percent of women and 15 percent of men had at least some secondary education or higher. Due to
small numbers, respondents with higher education are grouped together with those who had secondary
education, and the education category is reclassified into "secondary and higher" in subsequent tables
in this report.
In terms of religious affiliation, one in two women and men are Orthodox, nearly one in three
are Muslim, and 16 percent are Protestant. Thirty-five percent of women and 37 percent of men are
Oromos, 32 percent of women and 30 percent of men are Amharas, 7 percent of women and 6 percent
of men are Tigraway, and 5 percent of women and 4 percent of men are Guragies.
The fact that the Ethiopia DHS interviewed both women and men in some selected households
allows the unique opportunity to study couples’ attitudes and behaviors regarding fertility and family
planning. The survey gathered data from 1,355 couples, and some basic characteristics of spouses are
shown in Table 3.2.
The wife is 5 to 9 years younger than her husband among more than 2 in 5 couples, while the
wife is 0 to 4 years or 10 to14 years younger among 1 in 5 couples. Among 11 percent of the couples
the wife is 15 or more years younger than her husband. The mean age difference between a husband
and his wife is eight years. However, the mean age difference between a husband and his second wife
(in cases where the husband is in a polygynous union) is nearly 14 years. In a majority of the cases
(57 percent), neither the husband nor his wife are educated. Three percent of wives are more educated
than their husbands, while one in four husbands are more educated than their wives. In 16 percent of
the cases, both husband and wife are equally educated.
Respondent’s Characteristics and Status * 17