PIP: In India, epidemiologists followed 980 rural families with children less than 3 years old living near Calcutta in West Bengal to identify determinants related to maternal behavior and feeding practices of childhood diarrhea. They identified 570 families with diarrhea cases and 410 families with no diarrhea cases. Children with diarrhea were more likely to live in Kuchcha housing (44.7% vs. 33.9%; p = 0.0006), to have a family income of less than Rs.500/month (44.2% vs. 36.6%; p = 0.016) and a mother who was illiterate (53.5% vs. 45.4%; p = 0.013). Nondiarrheal families were more likely to have a sanitary latrine (63.9% vs. 50.5%; p = 0.000031) and have soap (for ablution, 22.9% vs. 14.4%; p = 0.0005 and, before food handling, 7.1% vs. 3%; p = 0.0046). Mothers with children who did not have diarrhea were more likely to space their births at least 4 years apart than those with children who did have diarrhea (20.5% vs. 14.7%; p = 0.018). Mothers with children who did not have diarrhea were also less likely to practice poor hygiene. Specifically, they would tend not to use leftover food for the next feeding (19.1% vs. 38%; p = 0.02), to have children whose body and clothes were dirty (19.1% vs. 40%; p = 0.01), to dispose of stools indiscriminately (55.3% vs. 73.7%; p = 0.02), to share a common latrine with other villagers (15.9% vs. 36.2%; p = 0.008), and to stop drinking water in a wide mouth container (66% vs. 84.8%; p = 0.008). Mothers with children who did not have diarrhea were also more likely to wash the container used for feeding the children with soap (48.9% vs. 30.4%; p = 0.03).