HIV/AIDS Knowledge in Bangladesh across Two Cohorts of Married Women

Niels-Hugo Blunch, Washington and Lee University
Maitreyi B. Das, World Bank Group

Using a recent household survey for two cohorts of married women, this paper examines three dimensions of HIV/AIDS knowledge in Bangladesh. HIV/AIDS knowledge is found to differ substantially across cohorts, with females from the younger cohort being far more knowledgeable than the older cohort in all three dimensions. Examining the correlates of HIV/AIDS knowledge, the woman’s own education is found to be a strong predictor overall, both in substantive and statistical terms. In some cases, a separate effect is found for spousal education. These findings differ widely across cohorts, however, with education being less strongly associated with HIV/AIDS knowledge for the younger cohort than for the older cohort. Detailed decompositions of the inter-generational knowledge gap reveals that more than anything else the lack of education for the older cohort relative to the younger cohort appears to have been driving the generational HIV/AIDS knowledge gap in Bangladesh in recent years.