Significant effects of Fatwa-based perception on contraceptive practice among Muslim women in south Jordan under the early stage of fertility transition.

An interview survey of 450 Muslim women in a rural village of south Jordan under the early stage of fertility transition was conducted to explore major causes of contraceptive use, taking both their sociodemographic attributes and fatwa (Islamic jurisprudence)-based perception into account. Discriminant analysis, which was performed for the subject women divided into 15- to 29-, 30- to 39-, and 40- to 49-year age groups, revealed that "the number of living children" in the former and "to do contraception for good care of children" in the latter played significant roles in discrimination into contraceptive user and nonuser groups for any age groups. To cope with demographically and socioeconmically vulnerable situations, contraceptive prevalence rate should be increased by means of government-led family planning programs in cooperation with the imam (Muslim religious leaders and priests) through fatwa, in which special attention is paid to traditional norms, represented by good childcare.