Intra-household joint decision making on child feeding and associated social determinants in rural districts of South Ethiopia: a multi-site concurrent mixed method study

In the rural districts of southern Ethiopia, joint intra-household decision making regarding child feeding was found to be satisfactory. Maternal education, husband's involvement in child feeding, mother's age, and number of children were independent variables that significantly influenced women's engagement in joint intra-household decision making on child feeding. Interventions targeted at improving women's engagement in decision-making should consider the following sociocultural barriers: extreme age differences between couples, large family sizes, and detrimental gender-oriented norms.