This report notes how adolescents in Azerbaijan are heavily monitored by family and their social environment. The opportunities for them to be alone or alone with a partner in a household are seldom. This leads to some youth finding makeout spots in semi-public places. The ASTRA report finds that a little over a half of Azerbaijani adolescence used any form of contraception during their first sexual experience.
And of those that did, nearly all used a condom. Moreover, asking adolescents about their sexual activity, in particular in a society where it is frowned upon, is challenging. I would love to see something more in-depth done. Women ages were asked when they first got married. I wish they had separated Baku, regional cities, and rural, but alas. Only 0. Table 10 shows breakdowns by region. In my observations, there is a strong expectation that new Azerbaijani wives begin having children. Especially male children.
Of the year old married women, almost half In Azerbaijan there is a strong expectation for girls to remain virgins until they are married. This is not the same case for boys. The UN survey asked year old girls about their sexual activity defined as sexually active in the last 4 weeks. In my observations, it is not uncommon for Azerbaijani grooms to be older than brides.
The data shows this as well. See Tables 15 and 16 in the report. See the last chapter of the UN report for more on this. Summarizing all of this was interesting, but my next step will to do my own analysis of the DHS data on these issues.
Stay tuned.
