The Impact of Urbanization and Socioeconomic Status on Infant Feeding Practices in Lagos, Nigeria

A report covers the first phase of an on-going national study to evaluate current maternal perceptions of infant feeding among different ethnic, religious, cultural, and socioeconomic groups in urbanized Nigeria. The main objective of the study is to assess the extent of breast-feeding decline, the principal factors responsible for this negative change, and how best to institute corrective eductional measures. Present findings demonstrate that virtually all mothers studied still held strong positive feelings about the importance of breast-feeding. However, a wide discrepancy was found between actual infant feeding practices of mothers and their expressed views on what these practices should be. One influencing factor appears to be the great pressure on mothers to spend more time trying to augment the family income at the expense of caring adequately for their children. (wz)