Research chronicle

Abstract Under-five mortality estimates for low- and middle-income countries are primarily derived from detailed birth or pregnancy histories collected through in-person household surveys. Such surveys are, however, resource intensive and vulnerable to interruption during epidemic outbreaks and other crises. Remotely deployed mobile phone surveys can circumvent these disadvantages, but their suitability for measuring population-level mortality has not been demonstrated. In this contribution, we examine Malawian mobile phone survey data from the Summary Birth Histories, Truncated Pregnancy Histories, and Full Pregnancy Histories instruments for estimating under-five mortality. Considering the limited penetration and the unequal distribution of mobile phones in Malawi, quota sampling was used to ensure representation of population subgroups where mobile phone ownership is low, and poststratification methods were applied to further attenuate selection bias. Resulting probabilities of dying, or q(x)—before 28 days, 12 months, and 60 months of life—are compared against external estimates from a recent Demographic and Health Survey, a Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, and model-based estimates from the UN Inter-agency Group of Child Mortality Estimation. Mobile phone survey estimates using the Summary Birth Histories capture the historical trends of q(12m) and q(60m) up to 2018, but they are less reliable for the most recent years. Compared with external sources, estimates from the Truncated Pregnancy Histories appear to be biased downward. Estimates of q(28d), q(12m), and q(60m) from the Full Pregnancy Histories are in line with those published by the UN Inter-agency Group, but they are also suggestive of a mortality excess during the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020‒2022. We conclude that mobile phone surveys are a promising method for collecting under-five mortality data, and particularly so via the Full Pregnancy Histories instrument.

Abstract For decades, population research has been interested in the complex relationship between child mortality and fertility, with a key focus on identifying hoarding behavior (i.e., fertility response to expected aggregate child mortality). Using unique data from the Malawi Longitudinal Study of Families and Health, we investigate the impact of individual-specific subjective expectations about infant mortality on fertility behavior. We instrument the potentially endogenous infant mortality expectations with the average of parents’ ratings of children's health to address the potential for omitted variable bias, such as parental preference for health. Consistent with the hoarding mechanism, we find that a 10-percentage-point increase in community-level child mortality expectations leads to a 14-percentage-point increase in the propensity to have a child in the next two years from a baseline propensity of 39%.

Demographers have long suspected that ordinary people in societies experiencing rapid demographic transition face difficulties in perceiving mortality decline. Recent empirical accounts have supported this supposition, demonstrating the extent of misperceptions in select transitioning societies and examining the individual life-course experiences that predate them. Yet, the broader significance of individuals misperceiving the presence or degree of mortality decline remains unclear. This paper examines whether individuals' perceptions of mortality conditions are systematically related to their perceptions of modern healthcare, as the old hypothesis suggested. Using data from the Tsogolo la Thanzi study of women in Balaka, Malawi-a context where mortality has declined dramatically alongside the expansion of modern healthcare-this study assesses whether a pessimistic outlook on mortality corresponds with scepticism of modern healthcare. The results emphasize the continued need for demographic research that grapples with individuals' perceptions of mortality decline, given the broader salience of perceptions to population health matters.