Hindawi Publishing Corporation ISRN Pediatrics Volume 2013, Article ID 159542, 8 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/159542 Research Article Effect of Women’s Decision-Making Autonomy on Infant’s Birth Weight in Rural Bangladesh Arpana Sharma 1 and Manzur Kader 2 1 Department of Community Medicine, Manipal College of Medical Sciences (MCOMS), 155 Pokhara, Nepal 2 Department of Women’s and Children’s Health, International Maternal and Child Health (IMCH), Uppsala University, 751 85 Uppsala, Sweden Correspondence should be addressed to Arpana Sharma; arpanasharma20@gmail.com Received 14 September 2013; Accepted 11 November 2013 Academic Editors: M. Adhikari, S. K. Patole, and S. A. Sarker Copyright © 2013 A. Sharma and M. Kader. his is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Background. Low birth weight (LBW), an outcome of maternal undernutrition, is a major public health concern in Bangladesh where the problem is most prominent. Women’s decision-making autonomy is likely an important factor inluencing maternal and child health outcomes. he aim of the study was to assess the efect of women’s decision-making autonomy on infant’s birth weight (BW). Methods. he study included data of 2175 enrolled women (14–45 years of age) from the Maternal and Infant Nutritional Intervention in Matlab (MINIMat-study) in Bangladesh. Pearson’s chi-square test, analysis of covariance (ANCOVA), and logistic regression analysis were applied at the collected data. Results. Women with lowest decision-making autonomy were signiicantly more likely to have a low birth weight (LBW) child, ater controlling for maternal age, education (woman’s and her husband’s), socioeconomic status (SES) (odds ratio (OR) = 1.4; 95% conidence interval (CI) 1.0, 1.8). BW was decreased signiicantly among women with lowest decision making autonomy ater adjusting for all confounders. Conclusion. Women’s decision-making autonomy has an independent efect on BW and LBW outcome. In addition, there is a need for further exploration to identify sociocultural attributes and gender related determinants of women decision-making autonomy in this study setting. 1. Background WHO has deined low birth weight (LBW) as birth weight (BW) less than 2500 g at birth which is a global public health concern [1]. About one half of the world’s low birth weight (LBW) babies are born in South Asia and Bangladesh has the highest incidence (31–47%) [1, 2]. BW is an important predictor of infant growth and survival and is strongly associated with early mortality and morbidity with adverse long-term outcomes [3, 4]. Low weight at birth is either the result of preterm delivery or intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR) [5]. BW is afected by various factors including maternal age, parity, BMI, quality of antenatal care, anaemia, and pregnancy induced hyper- tension (PIH) [6–10]. However, in developing countries like Bangladesh maternal undernutrition is a major determinant of LBW [11–15]. It has been reported that in many South Asian countries including Bangladesh women’s socioeconomic status is low and gender inequality persists in many sectors starting from intrahousehold food allocation, education, work, and property rights to decision-making matters. he majority of women have limited access to and control over resources and restriction in their mobility and are oten under threat of violence from male relatives [16–18]. Women’s autonomy is a multidimensional concept that remains ill-deined. here is no single accepted deinition that represents it well. In this study, women’s decision- making autonomy is deined as women personal power in the household and her ability to make and execute independent decisions of her own concern or about close family members which is closely associated with maternal and child health outcomes [19–21]. In a recent study in South India, it was observed that women with higher decision-making autonomy on inancial