PARENTS' PERCEIVED INFLUENCE OF EARLY MARRIAGE ON GIRL-CHILD EDUCATION IN GUSAU METROPOLIS AREA OF ZAMFARA STATE

Abstract
Education is the foundation for economic and social development of any country. Thus, education to all children either male or female is important. Early marriage is a global concept that affects the educational and social development as well as health, mental, and physical wellbeing of individual. Parental influence is seen to have a greater impact on early child marriage. Many parents justify the denial of girls' right to education, as marrying off their daughters as early as possible to prevent them from becoming sexually active before marriage, and not to bring dishonor to the family and community. This study examined the parents' perceived influence of early marriage on girl-child education in Gusau Metropolis, Zamfara State. Descriptive survey research design was adopted for this study. The population of this study comprised all parents of public primary school pupils in Gusau metropolis of Zamfara state. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 360 parents of primary six pupils in Gusau metropolis Zamfara State. One research question was raised, and three hypotheses were formulated. The research instrument that was used to obtain data from the respondents was a questionnaire titled' Questionnaire on Parents' Influence of Early Marriage on Girl Child Education (QPIEMGCE) and the instrument was subjected to face and content validity by four lecturers in the department of Early Childhood and Primary Education and the reliability coefficient (r=0.75) was obtained using test-retest method. Data obtained from respondents were analyzed using frequency count and mean for research question while Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze hypotheses one and two, while hypothesis three was tested using t-test all at 0.05 level of significance. Findings among others showed there was no significant difference in parents' perception of the influence of early marriage on girl child education based on socio-economic status of parents' income (F= 1.310; P > 0.05). It was concluded that parents' perception on early marriage has positive effect on girl-child education in Gusau metropolis. It was recommended that sensitization should be carried out regularly to educate parents on the need to educate the girl-child, also, government should regularly organize seminar to educate parents and pupils on the importance of girl-child education.
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