Predicting Markers of Adulthood among Adolescent Mothers Monica L. Oxford, Jungeun O. Lee, and Mary Jane Lohr This prospective longitudinal study examines the antecedents of adolescent mothers’ transition into adulthood and their attainment of multiple adult statuses in their early 30s in a nonclinical sample.The distribution, timing, and impact of factors in adolescence (education, employment, marriage, economic status, criminal involvement, and others) are shown relative to their impact on the transition into adulthood and attainment of typical markers of adulthood (employment, economic status, marriage, postsecondary education, and family formation). Descriptive data of demographic variables for adolescent mothers are reported from birth of child at average age 16 through 16 years postpartum at average age 32. Logistic regression results indicate that of all the factors examined in adolescence, on-time graduation from high school or receipt of a GED (by age 19) influenced the attainment of multiple markers of adulthood. Implications for intervention and policy with regard to completion of basic education are discussed. Key words: adolescent
mothers; educational attainment; high school; transition to adulthood
I
n a recent edited book dedicated to transitions to adulthood for vulnerable populations, Wald (2005) argued that vulnerable populations of youths preparing to transition to adulthood are poorly equipped for success because they lack the “extensive support” that other youths experience during the transitional years from adolescence to adulthood. During this transitional period from 18 to 30 years of age, young adults simultaneously undergo multiple role shifts and status changes in employment and unemployment, school attendance and school leaving, family and romantic relationships, marriage and divorce, residence and migration, and parenting status (Rindfuss, 1991). Rindfuss referred to this period as “demographically dense,” a period in the life course in which more demographic shifts occur than at any other time and a period marked by a scarcity of resources. In the general population, young adulthood is marked by fewer economic resources and less access to power (Rindfuss, 1991); for vulnerable populations there is even greater loss of resources. Some youths “age out” of the systems of support that are available to them, such as youths in foster care, who are less likely to rely on kinship networks as a source of support (Courtney & Heuring, 2005); other youths, such as those who are institutionalized, are prevented from developmentally normative activities that would enable them to gain access to postinstitutional education or employment
opportunities during young adulthood (Chung, Little, & Steinberg, 2005).The purpose of this study was to examine adolescent mothers’ transition into adulthood and the role of antecedents that promote transition and those that impede it. Like other vulnerable groups, adolescent mothers as youths (prior to becoming parents) are exposed to a greater number of risk factors that covary with poor adulthood outcomes, including poverty and correlates of poverty. Kalil and Kunz (1999) and others (Hotz, McElroy, & Sanders, 1997) compared risk factors of adolescent mothers to nonchildbearing adolescents in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data and found that a higher proportion of teenage mothers were members of a racial–ethnic minority group (African American or Hispanic), lived with a single mother at age 14, had family income below the poverty threshold, had a mother who had not obtained a high school diploma, had larger families, had fewer educational resources in the home, and lived in an urban area with a high percentage of female-headed households.Thus, adolescent mothers are not randomly distributed in the population; they are more likely to be vulnerable to difficulties in their transition to adulthood because of early exposure to poverty and related risks. Given that adolescent mothers are, in the aggregate, a vulnerable subpopulation of youths, the identification of factors related to their achievement
CCC Code: 1070-5309/10 ©2010 National Association of Social Workers Oxford, Lee, and$3.00 Lohr / Predicting Markers of Adulthood among
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of demographic markers of adulthood has implications for intervention and support. There are few contemporary longitudinal studies of adolescent mothers by which to examine how adolescent mothers managed the transition into adulthood under these disadvantaged circumstances. Furthermore, there is virtually no research assessing the relative importance of the timing of important milestones in the transition into adulthood among this subpopulation. This article seeks to address these gaps in the current literature by using data from a prospective longitudinal study with a contemporary sample of adolescent mothers, providing a contemporary portrait of the demographic markers of adulthood, and investigating the potential impacts of the timing of demographic milestones in late adolescence on long-term adult outcomes. Focusing on markers of adulthood, we recognize the lack of consensus on the definition of adulthood, which may be particularly true for adolescent mothers who have early “attainment” of significant events often associated with adulthood, such as parenthood and marriage. Marriage, for example, is confounded with other adult outcomes in unexpected ways; for many adolescent mothers, marriage is fraught with potential problems, including reduced educational attainment (Upchurch & McCarthy, 1990). Furstenberg (1976) noted that after delivery, many young single mothers were more motivated to return to school, whereas marriage within one year of delivery was related to dropping out. Weed, Keogh, and Borkowski (2000) noted that early marriage derails young women’s movement toward self-sufficiency (education and employment) and that early marriages are quite unstable.Ten years post first marriage, divorce rates are twice as high for young women under the age of 18 as they are for those over 25 (Barmlett & Mosher, 2001). In addition, Weed et al. (2000) argued that to finish school, adolescent mothers often rely on extended family or public assistance—which are typically viewed as measures of dependency and markers antithetical to a “normative” expectation of adulthood. However, for adolescent mothers, family dependency and public assistance may be the only mechanisms available to support their movement toward other markers of adult status. Mouw (2005) argued that full-time employment is a marker of adulthood for young women and their partners, but this definition is problematic for women with dependent children who do not have a partner and are unable to work full time.Thus,
in this article we describe the occurrence of typical markers of adulthood without suggesting the desirability of such markers, because some are not simply desirable (for example, marriage) or undesirable (for example, public assistance) when taken in context of the life experience of young mothers.
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Antecedents to Attainment of Markers of Adult Status for Adolescent Mothers
Building on relevant previous research, we have identified several key domains of study that are relevant to understanding outcomes for young mothers, including family of origin resources, financial insecurity, education completion, family size, family disruptions, and age at first birth. The following sections summarize the relevance of some of the basic antecedents of adulthood in the context of adolescent parenting. Family of Origin Socioeconomic Status
An important antecedent to adult outcomes for adolescent mothers is family of origins’ socioeconomic status. Parental income and education have been demonstrated to be highly predictive of adult outcomes, such as high school graduation (Sum et al., 2003) and adult economic status (Guldi, Page, & Huff Stevens, 2007). High School Completion
Completing basic education is known as one of the most important factors contributing to success in adulthood in the United States (Ceci & Williams, 1997).Youths who have dropped out of high school are considered extremely vulnerable for poor adult outcomes because low education places them at risk for poor employment prospects (Furstenberg, Kennedy, McCloyd, Rumbaut, & Settersten, 2003). In particular, the association of educational attainment with economic success in adulthood has been well documented (Rumberger & Lamb, 2003). High school dropouts with a GED earn more income than do their counterparts without a GED (Tyler, Murnane, & Willett, 2000). In addition, higher education attainment and adult economic status are positively associated with stable employment in adulthood (Klerman & Karoly, 1994). Educational completion has been a particular focus of attention in studying the lives and well-being of young mothers. It has been asserted that having a child as a teenager has negative effects on education
completion and on long-term economic outcomes. However, Upchurch and McCarthy (1990) found that, after controlling for background characteristics, having a child while enrolled in school did not lead to dropping out of school; the majority of those having a baby while in school graduated. Similarly, Upchurch (1993) found that those young mothers who dropped out of school prior to giving birth were less likely to graduate from high school, and later research showed that this pattern was associated with young mothers’ highly disadvantaged backgrounds in their youth.
of family background resources, are more likely to acquire important skills during their employment rather than through higher education.Thus, it would follow that the development of job-seeking skills and on-the-job training would benefit them in the long term. In other words, early employment may help the transition to adulthood for adolescent mothers, in part, by providing access to resources and opportunities that might enhance the transition into adulthood for youths, including at-risk or vulnerable youths (Furstenberg & Hughes, 1995). Other Relevant Developmental Markers
Dependence on Public Assistance
Another potential antecedent to adult outcomes for adolescent mothers is dependency on public assistance. As noted by Furstenberg et al. (2003), financial independence is one of the main markers of attainment of adult status. Adolescent mothers have been consistently portrayed as dependent on public assistance throughout their young adult years as they raise their children. Hotz et al. (1997), however, concluded that adolescent mothers come from a population with greater use of public assistance and lower educational attainment, and they are more likely to come from lower income families with greater stress and less education.They reasoned that in order to examine the impact of early parenthood on the use of public benefits, it would be necessary to control for confounding circumstances in the family background. Hotz et al. (1997) compared similarly aged adolescent mothers with girls who became pregnant and later miscarried and concluded that there was essentially no difference in the annual receipt of public benefits between the two groups. Employment
Early employment history is potentially important to long-term adult outcomes and their correlates. However, there is disagreement regarding the potential impact of adolescent employment (Hansen & Jarvis, 2000). Suggested benefits include a greater likelihood of continuous employment after high school (Geis, Klein, & Carroll, 1997). Some researchers, however, have pointed to potential harms of early employment, including less school engagement (Steinberg & Dornbusch, 1991). It is not known whether early employment history hinders or promotes transition into adulthood for adolescent mothers. Hotz et al. (1997) noted that adolescent mothers, as a fairly disadvantaged population in terms
Several factors may also be important to explaining long-term adult outcomes of adolescent mothers, including age at first birth, number of births at a young age, and separations from child.Typically, age of first birth is examined relative to the mothers’ parenting capacity (Moore, Morrison, & Greene, 1997) or outcomes for offspring (Turley, 2003). Less is known with respect to age of first birth and achievement of adulthood milestones. When comparing older and younger mothers, Hobcraft and Kiernan (2001) found that entering motherhood prior to age 23 was related to poorer adulthood outcomes (single parenthood, dependency on public assistance, low income, and poor health) relative to those entering motherhood at age 23 or older. Research has also shown that multiple early births are associated with more difficulty in the transition to adulthood (Hamilton, Martin, & Ventura, 2005). Furstenberg, Brooks-Gunn, and Chase-Lansdale (1989) found that adolescent mothers were more likely to enter the labor force when their youngest child was of school age; consequently, multiple early births may delay entry into the labor force or postsecondary education and may contribute to greater financial strain. Another potential proxy for risk is the number of separations a mother has from her child. Although the number of separations from a child is not a typical variable represented in the literature, it is conceptualized in this study as a proxy for instability. Separations happen for many reasons, most of which represent some form of instability, such as a mother losing her housing and the child going to live with a relative for several months, formal foster care, maternal incarceration or residential treatment for substance use or mental illness, or change in custodial caregiver through divorce or change in relationships; other reasons for separations may be
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due to military involvement, return to education, or informal living arrangements between kin networks that may be positive but still represent a significant life event in the family. Finally, early involvement in criminal behavior is a risk factor that is important to assess relative to attainment of adulthood outcomes. In earlier analyses with this sample, we found an important link between early involvement in delinquency and long-term adult trajectories and outcomes (Oxford, Gilchrist, Gillmore, & Lohr, 2006; Oxford et al., 2005). Hypotheses
In this study, the antecedents can be viewed as platforms by which individuals garner opportunities and resources to support the transition into adulthood. Analysis of within-group processes enables us to understand the factors that lead to outcomes for members of a population who share similar contexts or situations (O’Brien, 2005); consequently, potential areas in which policy change or intervention service might be implicated are identified with respect to the population of interest.Thus, we conceptualize attainment of roles or positions that enable access to resources as growth promoting and hypothesize that the earlier these opportunities are accessed, the greater generative capacity for positive outcomes. We hypothesize that “on-time” graduation from high school or attainment of a GED is generative of greater long-term opportunities. Similarly, exposure to early employment opportunities facilitates greater access to networks and resources that enhance adult developmental outcomes. Use of public assistance may work in a variety of ways; it is possible that it will constrain access to vital opportunities that enhance movement into adulthood or it may also operate to provide resources that enable young mothers to return to education or stay at home with their children. Conversely, we hypothesize that risk factors such as large family size, separations from target child, and age at first birth will constrain movement toward attainment of adulthood status.
counties surrounding a northwestern U.S. metropolitan city. The analyses presented here include data from the pregnancy interviews (1988 to 1990) through 16 years postpartum (2004 to 2006). Sample
Participants were recruited from more than 50 agencies and programs identified because they served pregnant teenagers, including public and private hospital prenatal clinics, public school alternative programs, and social service agencies. Because recruitment procedures included advertising, a conventional overall response rate could not be calculated. However, approach and consent data were obtained at one of the participating agencies—a large county hospital prenatal clinic—and 76% of those eligible agreed to participate. Recruitment took place from June 1988 through January 1990, until the sample of 240 pregnant teenagers was obtained. The sample size was selected to maximize power for the analyses planned. The sample for the present analyses consisted of 232 (97%) of the original sample. Omitted from these analyses were three respondents who died, one who dropped out of the study, and four whose children died. At the first interview, the majority (62%) of respondents were financially dependent on parents, guardians, or other relatives; 22% reported that public assistance was their main source of income, followed by financial support within a relationship (9%), employment (2%), or other more idiosyncratic means of financial support (6%). The majority of respondents were white (53%), followed by African American (28%), Native American (6%), Asian American (3%), and other (10%); 8% reported Hispanic ethnicity. Respondents’ ages at enrollment ranged from 12 to 17 years (M = 16.6 years).The age and ethnic makeup of the sample is representative of adolescents who gave birth in the study area for the years in which the sample was recruited. Procedures
The study is a longitudinal survey following the lives of adolescent mothers and their children. The community sample of 240 unmarried pregnant adolescents, age 17 and under and planning to carry their babies to term, was recruited from three urban
The study involved in-person interviews; telephone interviews were conducted only with participants who had moved out of the area.The proportion of interviews conducted by telephone increased over the course of the study and averaged 11%. Respondents were paid for their participation ($15 to $50 based on the wave of data collection). Respondents were assured of their confidentiality and were aware that the project had a Certificate of Confidentiality
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Method
Study Overview
from the federal government. The study protocol was approved by the Human Subjects Division at the institution where the research was conducted. Parental or guardian consent was obtained for study participants who were not emancipated minors. Data reported here were collected at 16 study points, from pregnancy through 16 years postpartum. The interviews were intermittently spaced to maximize data collection at sensitive periods of the children’s development and contingent on grant funding. Respondents were interviewed during pregnancy and one month postpartum, every six months from six to 18 months and 3.5 years to six years, and every year from 9.5 to 11.5 years and 15 to 16 years postpartum. Measures
Description of Demographic Markers of Adult Status from Pregnancy to 16 Years Postpartum. A series of dichotomous variables was created for the adult status measures at each study point to explore longitudinal change in the occurrence of demographic markers of adulthood among adolescent mothers. These variables included marital status, high school diploma or GED, postsecondary education, employment status (employed full- or part-time), and financial dependence (relying on public assistance as the primary income source; thus, not being financially dependent would indicate adult status) and reflected the current status at each study point. Antecedents to Later Adulthood Outcomes. Consistent with our interest in the issue of timing of passage through adult transition tasks, a series of antecedent measures was constructed to be age specific. Basic education completion had three categories indicating whether respondents completed high school or earned a GED by age 19: “0” indicated high school or GED completion by age 19; “1” indicated high school or GED completion by an older age; “2” indicated no high school completion. Earlier labor force participation reflected respondents’ involvement in their first full- or part-time job before age 20: Employment at least once before age 20 was coded “0”; employment started after age 20 was coded “1”; and never employed was coded “2.” Earlier financial dependence during the period between pregnancy and five years postpartum (average age 22) was coded as “1” for public assistance as the primary source of income more than two-thirds of the period and “0” otherwise. Age at the first birth, number of births before age 25, and number
of separations from the study child before age 25 were also included as measures of adult transition risk factors. High school completion of respondents’ mother (grandmother) was included as a proxy for family of origins’ socioeconomic status, which was defined as “1” for the high school completion and “0” otherwise. Adolescent detention was scored “1” for being held in jail or juvenile detention and “0” otherwise. Outcomes: Markers of Adulthood. Markers of adulthood were from data collected at two study points (15 and 16 years postpartum), when participants were on average 32 and 33 years old. Marital status during adulthood was created by aggregating respondents’ marital status: Being married at either of these two study points was coded as “1” and “0” otherwise.A measure of large family size (more than four live births) by age 25 was coded as “1” and “0” otherwise. As measures for education attainment during adulthood, two variables were identified: (1) attending any postsecondary educational institute and (2) attending a college. Both measures were dichotomous and scored as “1” for positive responses and “0” otherwise. Economic hardship was scored as “1” for being less than 1.85 in income-to-needs ratios at the last study point and “0” otherwise. Income-to-needs ratios were calculated by comparing annual household income to the poverty threshold for the corresponding year. Households with income-to-needs ratios below 1.00 are classified as “poor,” and those below 1.85 are classified as “near poor” (Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, & Maritato, 1997). In the present study, an income-to-needs ratio of 1.85 was chosen to reflect our interest in general financial status and not extreme financial deprivation.We also note that this measure is different from financial dependence previously defined among the longitudinal demographic markers; economic hardship does not necessarily indicate reliance on public assistance as the primary income source.Adulthood labor force participation reflected respondents’ involvement in full-time work at either of the last two study points. It was scored as “1” for positive responses and “0” otherwise. Statistical Analysis
To assess the impact of timing of accomplishment of adult transition tasks, we evaluated logistic regressions separately for each adult outcome. We created a series of dummy variables for basic education completion and earlier labor force participation.
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sion parameters and standard errors were combined using proc MI in SAS version 9.1.
The reference category for basic education was ontime completion; for early labor force participation, the reference category was employment before age 20. Because we had several predictors and outcomes, we reduced the model in a systematic fashion as suggested by Hosmer and Lemeshow (2000); first, we conducted bivariate tests of predictors for each of the markers of adulthood, and we retained significant predictors (p < .10) for the multivariate analysis. The percentage of missingness in the data ranged from 5.2% to 13.4%, depending on measures. For all logistic regression analyses, missing data were managed via multiple imputation (MI), which has been widely evaluated as an advanced statistical tool to handle missingness with less bias than traditional methods of handling missing data, such as listwise deletion (Schafer & Graham, 2002). Using the PAN imputation function in R, five separate data sets were imputed. The imputation models included demographic markers; time invariant predictors, such as age at the first birth; and time invariant markers of adulthood, such as economic hardship at the last study point. Race was included in the imputation model with a dummy-coded indicator (1= person of color, 0 = white person). All multivariate regres-
Results
Demographic Markers of Adult Status from Pregnancy to 16 Years Postpartum
To provide important descriptive data on this diverse, nonclinical sample of adolescent mothers over time, the demographic markers of adult status from pregnancy through 16 years postpartum were graphed. The proportion of respondents who had public assistance as their primary income source, were married, had graduated from high school, had furthered their education post high school, and were employed from pregnancy of target child (at average age 16.6 years) to 16 years postpartum (at average age 32.8 years) is presented in Figure 1. In contrast to the public perception of adolescent mothers, there was a steady decrease in the percentage of public assistance reliance and an increase in employment. At the pregnancy interview, 41% were dependent on welfare; welfare dependence steadily grew to 62% at 3.5 years postpartum (average age 20.5) and then decreased every year thereafter. This trend in the usage of public assistance was interwoven with
Figure 1. Descriptive Data of Life Course Events/ Status of Adolescent Mothers over Time 0.9 0.8 Public Assistance Married High School Post-HS Employed
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the steady increase in attainment of a high school diploma or GED and employment. By 16 years postpartum, respondents were, on average, 32.8 years of age, and 83% had graduated from high school or received their GED. During target pregnancy, none of the respondents were married; marriage rates slowly increased, peaking at 41% at 15 years postpartum. Impact of Timing of Accomplishment of Adult Transition Tasks on Adult Status Outcomes
Next, we considered the association between the timing of transitional milestones and multiple longterm adult outcomes. Means and standard deviations of the antecedents outcomes measured for this study are presented in Table 1. Logistic Regression for Each Outcome
Marital Status. The odds ratios—that is, the exponentials of the corresponding coefficients—are reported in Table 2.Young women who graduated from high school or earned a GED by the age of 19
were 1.88 (1/.53) times more likely to be married during adulthood, as compared with those who accomplished this adult transitional task at ages older than 19.The more separations from the study child young women experienced, the less likely they were to be involved in a marital relationship during adulthood—the odds of being married decreased by .88 with one unit increase in the number of separations from the study child. Number of Births. Those with delayed high school graduation or GED (at ages older than 19) were 1.95 times more likely to give birth more than four times, as compared with those who completed their basic education by age 19. Compared with those who completed their basic education by age 19, women without a high school diploma or GED were 2.65 times more likely to have more than four births. We also found that as age of first birth increased, there was a lower odds (.66) of four or more births by age 32.8. Economic Hardship. We found a statistically significant association between earlier financial dependence and economic hardship in adulthood.
Table 1: Descriptive Data on Independent and Dependent Variables Mean or Variable Proportion
Independent Grandmother graduated from high school Age at first birth Earlier financial dependence Detention by age 18 Number of children by age 25 Separations from study child by age 25 Basic education completion High school graduation by age 19 High school graduation after age 19 No high school graduation or GED Earlier labor force participation Employed by age 20 Employed after age 20 Never employed Dependent Married during adulthood Adulthood labor force participation More than four live births Ever attended college Ever attended any postsecondary education Economic hardship: Below 1.85 income-to-needs ratio
.71 16.64 .42 .19 2.5 1.85
SD Range
.45 1.20 .50 .39 .99 3.33
0 – 1 13 – 19 0 – 1 0 – 1 1 – 5 0 – 12
.49 .50 .46 .29 .45 .50
0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1
.53 .33 .14 .69 .27 .03 .39 .53 .31 .09 .72 .46
Note: This table is based on nonimputed data.
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Table 2: Logistic Regression Results (Odds Ratios) Dependent Variables Ever any More than Postsecondary Ever Economic Labor Force Four Live Independent Variable Education College Hardship Participation Marriage Births
Grandmother graduated from high school Age at first birth Earlier financial dependence Number of births by age 25 Adolescent detention Separations from study child by age 25 Basic education completiona High school graduation or GED after age 19 No high school graduation or GED Earlier labor force participationb Employed after age 20 Never employed
2.01† 1.3 — — .74 —
— — — .59† — —
— — 2.64* — — —
— — — — .64 —
— — — — .86 .89*
.59 .66* — — — 1.08†
.28* .06*
.15* .00*
1.79† 1.62
.51* .22*
.53* .94
1.95 2.65†
— —
— —
— —
— —
— —
— —
Note: Dashes mean excluded in the model-building process for the corresponding outcome. a The reference group = high school graduation or GED by age 19. b The reference group = employed by age 20. † < .10. *p < .05.
Discussion
Those exposed to earlier extreme economic adversity were 2.64 times more likely to experience adulthood economic hardship, as compared with those who were not. Similarly, those who had delayed educational attainment were 1.79 times more likely to experience economic hardship in adulthood. Education. It is not surprising that the timing of basic education completion was associated with the pursuit of postsecondary education. When young women finished high school at ages older than 19, the odds of any postsecondary education and college dropped by .28 and .15, respectively. In other words, those who completed their basic education by age 19 were about six times (1/.15) more likely to attend college and 3.6 times (1/.28) more likely to pursue any education beyond high school. Number of births before age 25 was negatively associated with attending college—a one unit increase in number of births before age 25 resulted in a decrease in the odds of attending college by .59. Employment. Those who completed basic education by age 19 were about two times (1/.51) more likely to engage in full-time employment than were those who completed basic education at ages older than 19 and were 4.55 times (1/.22) more likely to be employed with a full-time job than were those without a high school diploma or GED.
Descriptively, the results show that over time the vast majority of adolescent mothers gained a high school level of education. Similarly, marriage increased steadily over time, but no more than 41% of the sample at any one time reported being married. In addition, dependence on public assistance increased gradually during the first 3.5 years postpartum, then steadily decreased until the last two waves of data, where there was a slight increase in the use of public assistance when the women were in their early 30s. Employment increased over time, with an average of 60% employed between ages 26 and 32. The study provides partial support for the hypothesis that that there is a domain-specific effect of earlier problems in one area related to later outcomes in the same area, as we expected. However, with the exception of high school completion, there did not appear to be cross-over effects to other domains of adult outcomes. For example, economic hardship was predicted by earlier dependence on public benefits and only marginally by high school graduation after age 19. The likelihood of any postsecondary education was less for those who postponed high school education until after age 19 or who did not graduate; grandmothers’ high school education was marginally associated with any postsecondary education. In this analysis, separation from child
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was marginally related to having more than four live births and significantly related to a lower likelihood of marriage. Consequently, this is an area for further exploration. Although there are multiple reasons for separation from the target child—some of which would be positive—in the aggregate, this variable appears to tap potential difficulty during the transition into adulthood, pointing to family composition and size. In addition, separations should be assessed relative to child outcomes; clearly, if separations are due to instability within the family environment, then a relationship with adjustment problems for the child might be expected in the larger context of risk. Contrary to our hypothesis, early labor force participation was not related to later employment status or any of the other measurements of adult attainment. Although the vast majority of adolescent mothers had been employed by age 20, the typically low-level jobs they held probably did not give them the opportunity to access resources to enhance their transition into adulthood. Our findings suggest that promoting early work experiences for young mothers will not ensure financial independence in early adulthood or provide support for attainment of other markers of adulthood. It is possible that some types of jobs and employment settings would provide more opportunities for growth than others; more research in this area would be informative. The logistic regression results suggest that timing of high school completion is important for adolescent mothers; as expected, delay in high school completion past age 19 or no high school education was related to a lower probability of fulltime employment and achieving any postsecondary education. Similarly, participants’ completion of a high school education after age 19 was also related to a lower probability of being married during their early 30s relative to completing high school by age 19, whereas not having a high school education was unrelated to later likelihood of marriage. Only delayed high school education was related to economic hardship relative to completing high school by age 19; “no high school completion” did not predict economic status at 16 years postpartum. As noted, we explored why lack of high school completion was not related in the way we had expected, and we concluded that it was highly correlated with early cumulative economic hardship, and so it essentially was the first event in a series of events that foretold the long-term outcomes for adolescent mothers.
The most striking outcome of this study was the pervasive influence of the timing of high school completion on the adolescent mothers’ transition into adulthood. Although most studies have examined education more generally, we were interested in whether the timing of the completion of high school or GED was relevant to long-term outcomes. The timing of high school education was the only variable that was relevant to all of the adult outcomes, highlighting the importance of on-time high school completion for adolescent mothers. This is important because earlier studies have shown that adolescent mothers typically take longer to achieve certain adult statuses (such as school completion) because they take on the role of parent, which often supersedes other roles or makes it difficult to balance multiple roles (Whitman, Borkowski, Keogh, & Weed, 2001). Both later high school completion and no high school completion were risk factors for adult outcomes. Two important issues should be addressed given the results of this study. First, why was on-time high school completion protective compared with high school completion after age 19? It may be that being on-track with respect to age-graded opportunity structures are important; finishing high school during the teenage years may open up access to other resources, such as school-based support for college entrance (including community college), job fairs for entry-level positions, access to job preparation resources, and age-graded entry-level positions.The second issue is to consider what factors contribute to on-time completion of high school. Although we know that poverty predicts dropout rates for adolescent mothers (Upchurch, 1993), we know less about what predicts on-time completion. It may be that there are personal characteristics that differentiate between those who finish on time and those who do not or those who drop out. Leadbeater (1996) found that adolescent mothers’ delayed grade placement (an indication of school problems or retention) was the strongest predictor of graduation status at three years postpartum. Although early academic performance may be important, alternative hypotheses should be examined. It is possible that those who finish their basic education also have additional supports, either through school or family, that enable them to stay in school during adolescence. Leadbeater (1996) found that adolescent mothers who stayed in school or returned after the birth reported that they had help with child care, whereas those who dropped
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out prior to or after pregnancy reported less help. Finally, there may be contextual influences such as in the socioeconomic status of the family of origin, instrumental and emotional support from extended family, or resources available within the community. Upchurch (1993) found that female adolescents who dropped out of school prior to becoming adolescent mothers were the most disadvantaged. More research is needed to understand the factors that promote on-time high school completion for adolescent mothers and identification of the mechanisms of high school completion responsible for producing the relationship between on-time school completion and adulthood outcomes. The findings regarding education suggest that policy and services that enable young mothers to complete their education in a timely fashion are essential for long-term adult outcomes. The passage of the Educational Amendments of 1972 and Title IX (U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, 1991) made it possible for pregnant students (regardless of marital status) to have equal access to education; however, this mandate did not include requirements for additional services that enable pregnant students to remain in school. As Dellinger (2004) argued, there is very little comprehensive support and great variability in school administrative behavior regarding pregnant students; for example, she noted that New York had numerous complaints that schools “pushed out,” “counseled out,” or “eased out” pregnant adolescents. Title IX mandates that schools receiving federal funding may not discriminate or exclude any student from educational services and programs due to pregnancy or childbirth. However, there are often underlying behaviors of individual schools that make it difficult for pregnant students to remain in school, such as discouraging pregnant teenagers from staying in their current school or refusing to provide make-up homework to adolescents recovering from childbirth (New York Civil Liberties Union, 2000). Although less is said in Title IX about parenting students, U.S. and state constitutional principles would protect parenting adolescents’ rights to equal education (Dellinger, 2004). Although there are several models of school-based programs, both within mainstream schools and in schools specially designed to serve pregnant and parenting teenagers, schools are generally not required to provide services that would enable young women to remain in school and graduate on time. Consequently, school-based
social workers are in a uniquely important position to work within the system by supporting access to educational opportunities and advocate for pregnant and parenting adolescents. Social workers, unlike most teachers, are able to access resources for students outside of school through multiple service systems to support adolescent mothers. In addition, as advocates, social workers can intercede on the behalf of adolescent mothers within the school system by supporting flexible administrative policies that support the unique needs of parenting students. Notably, maternal education is related to positive parenting practices (Luster & Su Min Oh, 2004) and improved child outcomes (Whitman et al., 2001), so intervention to ensure continued access to education should produce positive outcomes for both mother and child. As with all studies, the findings of this study need to be considered in context. This study was not based on a random sample; conclusions regarding outcomes should be viewed in the context of this regional sample based on the demographic distributions noted. In addition, some of the measures have limitations and should be considered carefully. It should be noted that although grandmother’s education is an indicator of the family of origin’s socioeconomic status, it does not assess the poverty status of the family; because of data limitations, it was necessary to rely on this one measure. Similarly, our early measure of economic insecurity is limited because we did not have income-to-needs ratios in the early years, and we could only analyze use of public assistance. To improve adult outcomes for adolescent mothers, additional research and policy assessment should focus on barriers preventing adolescent mothers from remaining in school and individual and community factors that contribute to school success and on-time graduation for young mothers. In addition, assumptions about the reasons adolescent mothers leave school should be explored with greater attention to formal and informal structural barriers (Dellinger, 2004).
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References Barmlett, M., & Mosher, W. (2001). First marriage dissolution, divorce, and remarriage: United States. Advance data from vital and health statistics; no. 323. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. Brooks-Gunn, J., Duncan, G. J., & Maritato, N. (1997). Poor families, poor outcomes: The well-being of children and youth. In G. J. Duncan, & J. Brooks-Gunn (Eds.), Consequences of growing up poor (pp. 1–17). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Ceci, S., & Williams, W. (1997). Schooling, intelligence, and income. American Psychologist, 52, 1051–1058. Chung, H., Little, M., & Steinberg, L. (2005). The transition to adulthood for adolescents in the juvenile justice system: A developmental perspective. In W. Osgood, M. Foster, C. Flanagan, & G. Ruth (Eds.), On your own without a net:The transition to adulthood for vulnerable populations (pp. 68–91). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Courtney, M., & Heuring, D. (2005). The transition to adulthood for youth “aging out” of the foster care system. In W. Osgood, M. Foster, C. Flanagan, & G. Ruth (Eds.), On your own without a net:The transition to adulthood for vulnerable populations (pp. 27–67). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Dellinger, A. (2004). Public schools and pregnant and parenting adolescents: A legal guide. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Institute of Government, School of Government. Furstenberg, F. (1976). Unplanned parenthood:The social consequences of teenage childbearing. New York: Free Press. Furstenberg, F., Brooks-Gunn, J., & Chase-Lansdale, L. (1989). Teenage pregnancy and childbearing. American Psychologist, 44, 313–320. Furstenberg, F., & Hughes, M. E. (1995). Social capital and successful development among at-risk youth. Journal of Marriage & the Family, 57, 580–592. Furstenberg, F. F., Kennedy, S., McCloyd,V. C., Rumbaut, R. G., & Settersten, R. A. (2003). Between adolescence and adulthood: Expectations about the timing of adulthood (Research Network Working Paper No. 1). Philadelphia: Network on Transitions to Adulthood and Public Policy. Geis, S., Klein, S. G., & Carroll, C. D. (1997). Continuity of early employment among 1980 high school sophomores, NCES 97-303. Washington, DC: Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. Guldi, M., Page, M., & Huff Stevens, A. (2007). Family background and children’s transition to adulthood over time. In S. Danziger & C. E. Rouse (Eds.), The price of independence:The economics of early adulthood (pp. 261–277). New York: Russell Sage Foundation. Hamilton, B., Martin, J., & Ventura S. (2005). Birth: Preliminary data for 2005. Hyattsville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. Hansen, D. M., & Jarvis, P. A. (2000). Adolescent employment and psychosocial outcomes: A comparison of two employment contexts. Youth & Society, 31, 417–436. Hobcraft, J., & Kiernan, K. (2001). Childhood poverty, early motherhood and adult social exclusion. British Journal of Sociology, 52, 495–517. Hosmer, D. W., & Lemeshow, S. (2000). Applied logistic regression. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Hotz,V. J., McElroy, S., & Sanders, S. (1997). The impacts of teenage childbearing on the mothers and the consequences of those impacts for government. In R. Maynard (Ed.), Kids having kids: Economic costs and social consequences of teen pregnancy (pp. 55–143). Washington, DC: Urban Institute Press. Kalil, A., & Kunz, J. (1999). First births among unmarried adolescent girls: Risk and protective factors. Social Work Research, 23, 197–208. Klerman, J. A., & Karoly, L. A. (1994).Young men and the transition to stable employment. Monthly Labor Review, 117, 32–48. Leadbeater, B. (1996). School outcomes for minoritygroup adolescent mothers at 28 to 36 months postpartum: A longitudinal follow-up. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 6, 629–648.
Luster, T., & Su Min Oh, K. (2004). Predictors of academic motivation in first grade among children born to low-income adolescent mothers. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 19, 337–353. Moore, A. K., Morrison, R. D., & Greene, D. A. (1997). Effects on the children born to adolescent mothers. In R. Maynard (Ed.), Kids having kids: Economic costs and social consequences of teen pregnancy (pp. 78–103). Washington, DC: Urban Institute Press. Mouw, T. (2005). Sequences of early adult transitions: A look at variability and consequences. In R. Settersten, F. Furstenberg, & R. Rumbaut (Eds.), On the frontier of adulthood:Theory, research, and public policy (pp. 256–291). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. New York Civil Liberties Union. (2000, December 1). Survey of New York City high school admissions practices regarding pregnant and parenting teens. New York: Author. O’Brien, M. (2005). Studying individual and family development: Linking theory and research. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 67, 880–890. Oxford, M. L., Gilchrist, L. D., Gillmore, M. R., & Lohr, M. J. (2006). Predicting variation in the life course of adolescent mothers as they enter adulthood. Journal of Adolescent Health, 39(1), 20–26. Oxford, M. L., Gilchrist, L. D., Lohr, M. J., Gillmore, M. R., Morrison, D. M., & Spieker, S. J. (2005). Life course heterogeneity in the transition from adolescence to adulthood among adolescent mothers. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 15, 479–504. Rindfuss, R. (1991). The young adult years: Diversity, structural change, and fertility. Demography, 28, 493–512. Rumberger, R. W., & Lamb, S. P. (2003). The early employment and further education experiences of high school dropouts: A comparative study of the United States and Australia. Economics of Education Review, 22, 353–366. Schafer, J. L., & Graham, J. W. (2002). Missing data: Our view of the state of the art. Psychological Methods, 7, 147–177. Steinberg, L., & Dornbusch, S. (1991). Negative correlates of part-time employment during adolescence: Replication and elaboration. Developmental Psychology, 27, 304–313. Sum, A., Harrington, P., Bartishevich, C., Fogg, N., Khatiwada, I., Motroni, J., et al. (2003, February 3). The hidden crisis in the high school dropout problems of young adults in the U.S.: Recent trends in overall school dropout rates and gender differences in dropout behavior. Paper presented at the Business Roundtable, Washington, DC. Turley, R. N. (2003). Are children of young mothers disadvantaged because of their mother’s age or family background? Child Development, 74, 465–474. Tyler, J. H., Murnane, R. J., & Willett, J. B. (2000). Estimating the labor market signaling value of the GED. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 115, 431–468. Upchurch, D. M. (1993). Early schooling and childbearing experiences: Implications for postsecondary school attendance. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 3, 423–443. Upchurch, D. M., & McCarthy, J. (1990). The timing of a first birth and high school completion. American Sociological Review, 55, 224–234. U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights. (1991). Teenage pregnancy and parenting issues under Title IX Educational Amendments of 1972 (Report Number ED ORD91-14). Retrieved from http://www.eric. ed.gov/ERICDocs/data/ericdocs2sql/content_ storage_01/0000019b/80/24/05/7b.pdf
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Wald, M. (2005). Foreword. In W. Osgood, M. Foster, C. Flanagan, & G. Ruth (Eds.), On your own without a net:The transition to adulthood for vulnerable populations (p. vii). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Weed, K., Keogh, D., & Borkowski. (2000). Predictors of resiliency in adolescent mothers. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 21, 207–231. Whitman, T., Borkowski, J., Keogh, D., & Weed, K. (2001). Interwoven lives: Adolescent mothers and their children. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Monica L. Oxford, PhD, is research associate professor, School of Social Work, University of Washington; Jungeun O. Lee, PhD, is a research scientist, School of Social Work, University of Washington; and Mary Jane Lohr, MS, is a research scientist, School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle. This research was funded by NIDA grant R01 DA05208 to Lewayne Gilchrist. Send correspondence to Monica Oxford, School of SocialWork, University of Washington, 4101 15th Avenue NE, Seattle,WA 98105; e-mail: [email protected]. Original manuscript received April 26, 2008 Final revision received January 6, 2009 Accepted January 26, 2009
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mothers; educational attainment; high school; transition to adulthood
I
n a recent edited book dedicated to transitions to adulthood for vulnerable populations, Wald (2005) argued that vulnerable populations of youths preparing to transition to adulthood are poorly equipped for success because they lack the “extensive support” that other youths experience during the transitional years from adolescence to adulthood. During this transitional period from 18 to 30 years of age, young adults simultaneously undergo multiple role shifts and status changes in employment and unemployment, school attendance and school leaving, family and romantic relationships, marriage and divorce, residence and migration, and parenting status (Rindfuss, 1991). Rindfuss referred to this period as “demographically dense,” a period in the life course in which more demographic shifts occur than at any other time and a period marked by a scarcity of resources. In the general population, young adulthood is marked by fewer economic resources and less access to power (Rindfuss, 1991); for vulnerable populations there is even greater loss of resources. Some youths “age out” of the systems of support that are available to them, such as youths in foster care, who are less likely to rely on kinship networks as a source of support (Courtney & Heuring, 2005); other youths, such as those who are institutionalized, are prevented from developmentally normative activities that would enable them to gain access to postinstitutional education or employment
opportunities during young adulthood (Chung, Little, & Steinberg, 2005).The purpose of this study was to examine adolescent mothers’ transition into adulthood and the role of antecedents that promote transition and those that impede it. Like other vulnerable groups, adolescent mothers as youths (prior to becoming parents) are exposed to a greater number of risk factors that covary with poor adulthood outcomes, including poverty and correlates of poverty. Kalil and Kunz (1999) and others (Hotz, McElroy, & Sanders, 1997) compared risk factors of adolescent mothers to nonchildbearing adolescents in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data and found that a higher proportion of teenage mothers were members of a racial–ethnic minority group (African American or Hispanic), lived with a single mother at age 14, had family income below the poverty threshold, had a mother who had not obtained a high school diploma, had larger families, had fewer educational resources in the home, and lived in an urban area with a high percentage of female-headed households.Thus, adolescent mothers are not randomly distributed in the population; they are more likely to be vulnerable to difficulties in their transition to adulthood because of early exposure to poverty and related risks. Given that adolescent mothers are, in the aggregate, a vulnerable subpopulation of youths, the identification of factors related to their achievement
CCC Code: 1070-5309/10 ©2010 National Association of Social Workers Oxford, Lee, and$3.00 Lohr / Predicting Markers of Adulthood among
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of demographic markers of adulthood has implications for intervention and support. There are few contemporary longitudinal studies of adolescent mothers by which to examine how adolescent mothers managed the transition into adulthood under these disadvantaged circumstances. Furthermore, there is virtually no research assessing the relative importance of the timing of important milestones in the transition into adulthood among this subpopulation. This article seeks to address these gaps in the current literature by using data from a prospective longitudinal study with a contemporary sample of adolescent mothers, providing a contemporary portrait of the demographic markers of adulthood, and investigating the potential impacts of the timing of demographic milestones in late adolescence on long-term adult outcomes. Focusing on markers of adulthood, we recognize the lack of consensus on the definition of adulthood, which may be particularly true for adolescent mothers who have early “attainment” of significant events often associated with adulthood, such as parenthood and marriage. Marriage, for example, is confounded with other adult outcomes in unexpected ways; for many adolescent mothers, marriage is fraught with potential problems, including reduced educational attainment (Upchurch & McCarthy, 1990). Furstenberg (1976) noted that after delivery, many young single mothers were more motivated to return to school, whereas marriage within one year of delivery was related to dropping out. Weed, Keogh, and Borkowski (2000) noted that early marriage derails young women’s movement toward self-sufficiency (education and employment) and that early marriages are quite unstable.Ten years post first marriage, divorce rates are twice as high for young women under the age of 18 as they are for those over 25 (Barmlett & Mosher, 2001). In addition, Weed et al. (2000) argued that to finish school, adolescent mothers often rely on extended family or public assistance—which are typically viewed as measures of dependency and markers antithetical to a “normative” expectation of adulthood. However, for adolescent mothers, family dependency and public assistance may be the only mechanisms available to support their movement toward other markers of adult status. Mouw (2005) argued that full-time employment is a marker of adulthood for young women and their partners, but this definition is problematic for women with dependent children who do not have a partner and are unable to work full time.Thus,
in this article we describe the occurrence of typical markers of adulthood without suggesting the desirability of such markers, because some are not simply desirable (for example, marriage) or undesirable (for example, public assistance) when taken in context of the life experience of young mothers.
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Antecedents to Attainment of Markers of Adult Status for Adolescent Mothers
Building on relevant previous research, we have identified several key domains of study that are relevant to understanding outcomes for young mothers, including family of origin resources, financial insecurity, education completion, family size, family disruptions, and age at first birth. The following sections summarize the relevance of some of the basic antecedents of adulthood in the context of adolescent parenting. Family of Origin Socioeconomic Status
An important antecedent to adult outcomes for adolescent mothers is family of origins’ socioeconomic status. Parental income and education have been demonstrated to be highly predictive of adult outcomes, such as high school graduation (Sum et al., 2003) and adult economic status (Guldi, Page, & Huff Stevens, 2007). High School Completion
Completing basic education is known as one of the most important factors contributing to success in adulthood in the United States (Ceci & Williams, 1997).Youths who have dropped out of high school are considered extremely vulnerable for poor adult outcomes because low education places them at risk for poor employment prospects (Furstenberg, Kennedy, McCloyd, Rumbaut, & Settersten, 2003). In particular, the association of educational attainment with economic success in adulthood has been well documented (Rumberger & Lamb, 2003). High school dropouts with a GED earn more income than do their counterparts without a GED (Tyler, Murnane, & Willett, 2000). In addition, higher education attainment and adult economic status are positively associated with stable employment in adulthood (Klerman & Karoly, 1994). Educational completion has been a particular focus of attention in studying the lives and well-being of young mothers. It has been asserted that having a child as a teenager has negative effects on education
completion and on long-term economic outcomes. However, Upchurch and McCarthy (1990) found that, after controlling for background characteristics, having a child while enrolled in school did not lead to dropping out of school; the majority of those having a baby while in school graduated. Similarly, Upchurch (1993) found that those young mothers who dropped out of school prior to giving birth were less likely to graduate from high school, and later research showed that this pattern was associated with young mothers’ highly disadvantaged backgrounds in their youth.
of family background resources, are more likely to acquire important skills during their employment rather than through higher education.Thus, it would follow that the development of job-seeking skills and on-the-job training would benefit them in the long term. In other words, early employment may help the transition to adulthood for adolescent mothers, in part, by providing access to resources and opportunities that might enhance the transition into adulthood for youths, including at-risk or vulnerable youths (Furstenberg & Hughes, 1995). Other Relevant Developmental Markers
Dependence on Public Assistance
Another potential antecedent to adult outcomes for adolescent mothers is dependency on public assistance. As noted by Furstenberg et al. (2003), financial independence is one of the main markers of attainment of adult status. Adolescent mothers have been consistently portrayed as dependent on public assistance throughout their young adult years as they raise their children. Hotz et al. (1997), however, concluded that adolescent mothers come from a population with greater use of public assistance and lower educational attainment, and they are more likely to come from lower income families with greater stress and less education.They reasoned that in order to examine the impact of early parenthood on the use of public benefits, it would be necessary to control for confounding circumstances in the family background. Hotz et al. (1997) compared similarly aged adolescent mothers with girls who became pregnant and later miscarried and concluded that there was essentially no difference in the annual receipt of public benefits between the two groups. Employment
Early employment history is potentially important to long-term adult outcomes and their correlates. However, there is disagreement regarding the potential impact of adolescent employment (Hansen & Jarvis, 2000). Suggested benefits include a greater likelihood of continuous employment after high school (Geis, Klein, & Carroll, 1997). Some researchers, however, have pointed to potential harms of early employment, including less school engagement (Steinberg & Dornbusch, 1991). It is not known whether early employment history hinders or promotes transition into adulthood for adolescent mothers. Hotz et al. (1997) noted that adolescent mothers, as a fairly disadvantaged population in terms
Several factors may also be important to explaining long-term adult outcomes of adolescent mothers, including age at first birth, number of births at a young age, and separations from child.Typically, age of first birth is examined relative to the mothers’ parenting capacity (Moore, Morrison, & Greene, 1997) or outcomes for offspring (Turley, 2003). Less is known with respect to age of first birth and achievement of adulthood milestones. When comparing older and younger mothers, Hobcraft and Kiernan (2001) found that entering motherhood prior to age 23 was related to poorer adulthood outcomes (single parenthood, dependency on public assistance, low income, and poor health) relative to those entering motherhood at age 23 or older. Research has also shown that multiple early births are associated with more difficulty in the transition to adulthood (Hamilton, Martin, & Ventura, 2005). Furstenberg, Brooks-Gunn, and Chase-Lansdale (1989) found that adolescent mothers were more likely to enter the labor force when their youngest child was of school age; consequently, multiple early births may delay entry into the labor force or postsecondary education and may contribute to greater financial strain. Another potential proxy for risk is the number of separations a mother has from her child. Although the number of separations from a child is not a typical variable represented in the literature, it is conceptualized in this study as a proxy for instability. Separations happen for many reasons, most of which represent some form of instability, such as a mother losing her housing and the child going to live with a relative for several months, formal foster care, maternal incarceration or residential treatment for substance use or mental illness, or change in custodial caregiver through divorce or change in relationships; other reasons for separations may be
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due to military involvement, return to education, or informal living arrangements between kin networks that may be positive but still represent a significant life event in the family. Finally, early involvement in criminal behavior is a risk factor that is important to assess relative to attainment of adulthood outcomes. In earlier analyses with this sample, we found an important link between early involvement in delinquency and long-term adult trajectories and outcomes (Oxford, Gilchrist, Gillmore, & Lohr, 2006; Oxford et al., 2005). Hypotheses
In this study, the antecedents can be viewed as platforms by which individuals garner opportunities and resources to support the transition into adulthood. Analysis of within-group processes enables us to understand the factors that lead to outcomes for members of a population who share similar contexts or situations (O’Brien, 2005); consequently, potential areas in which policy change or intervention service might be implicated are identified with respect to the population of interest.Thus, we conceptualize attainment of roles or positions that enable access to resources as growth promoting and hypothesize that the earlier these opportunities are accessed, the greater generative capacity for positive outcomes. We hypothesize that “on-time” graduation from high school or attainment of a GED is generative of greater long-term opportunities. Similarly, exposure to early employment opportunities facilitates greater access to networks and resources that enhance adult developmental outcomes. Use of public assistance may work in a variety of ways; it is possible that it will constrain access to vital opportunities that enhance movement into adulthood or it may also operate to provide resources that enable young mothers to return to education or stay at home with their children. Conversely, we hypothesize that risk factors such as large family size, separations from target child, and age at first birth will constrain movement toward attainment of adulthood status.
counties surrounding a northwestern U.S. metropolitan city. The analyses presented here include data from the pregnancy interviews (1988 to 1990) through 16 years postpartum (2004 to 2006). Sample
Participants were recruited from more than 50 agencies and programs identified because they served pregnant teenagers, including public and private hospital prenatal clinics, public school alternative programs, and social service agencies. Because recruitment procedures included advertising, a conventional overall response rate could not be calculated. However, approach and consent data were obtained at one of the participating agencies—a large county hospital prenatal clinic—and 76% of those eligible agreed to participate. Recruitment took place from June 1988 through January 1990, until the sample of 240 pregnant teenagers was obtained. The sample size was selected to maximize power for the analyses planned. The sample for the present analyses consisted of 232 (97%) of the original sample. Omitted from these analyses were three respondents who died, one who dropped out of the study, and four whose children died. At the first interview, the majority (62%) of respondents were financially dependent on parents, guardians, or other relatives; 22% reported that public assistance was their main source of income, followed by financial support within a relationship (9%), employment (2%), or other more idiosyncratic means of financial support (6%). The majority of respondents were white (53%), followed by African American (28%), Native American (6%), Asian American (3%), and other (10%); 8% reported Hispanic ethnicity. Respondents’ ages at enrollment ranged from 12 to 17 years (M = 16.6 years).The age and ethnic makeup of the sample is representative of adolescents who gave birth in the study area for the years in which the sample was recruited. Procedures
The study is a longitudinal survey following the lives of adolescent mothers and their children. The community sample of 240 unmarried pregnant adolescents, age 17 and under and planning to carry their babies to term, was recruited from three urban
The study involved in-person interviews; telephone interviews were conducted only with participants who had moved out of the area.The proportion of interviews conducted by telephone increased over the course of the study and averaged 11%. Respondents were paid for their participation ($15 to $50 based on the wave of data collection). Respondents were assured of their confidentiality and were aware that the project had a Certificate of Confidentiality
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Method
Study Overview
from the federal government. The study protocol was approved by the Human Subjects Division at the institution where the research was conducted. Parental or guardian consent was obtained for study participants who were not emancipated minors. Data reported here were collected at 16 study points, from pregnancy through 16 years postpartum. The interviews were intermittently spaced to maximize data collection at sensitive periods of the children’s development and contingent on grant funding. Respondents were interviewed during pregnancy and one month postpartum, every six months from six to 18 months and 3.5 years to six years, and every year from 9.5 to 11.5 years and 15 to 16 years postpartum. Measures
Description of Demographic Markers of Adult Status from Pregnancy to 16 Years Postpartum. A series of dichotomous variables was created for the adult status measures at each study point to explore longitudinal change in the occurrence of demographic markers of adulthood among adolescent mothers. These variables included marital status, high school diploma or GED, postsecondary education, employment status (employed full- or part-time), and financial dependence (relying on public assistance as the primary income source; thus, not being financially dependent would indicate adult status) and reflected the current status at each study point. Antecedents to Later Adulthood Outcomes. Consistent with our interest in the issue of timing of passage through adult transition tasks, a series of antecedent measures was constructed to be age specific. Basic education completion had three categories indicating whether respondents completed high school or earned a GED by age 19: “0” indicated high school or GED completion by age 19; “1” indicated high school or GED completion by an older age; “2” indicated no high school completion. Earlier labor force participation reflected respondents’ involvement in their first full- or part-time job before age 20: Employment at least once before age 20 was coded “0”; employment started after age 20 was coded “1”; and never employed was coded “2.” Earlier financial dependence during the period between pregnancy and five years postpartum (average age 22) was coded as “1” for public assistance as the primary source of income more than two-thirds of the period and “0” otherwise. Age at the first birth, number of births before age 25, and number
of separations from the study child before age 25 were also included as measures of adult transition risk factors. High school completion of respondents’ mother (grandmother) was included as a proxy for family of origins’ socioeconomic status, which was defined as “1” for the high school completion and “0” otherwise. Adolescent detention was scored “1” for being held in jail or juvenile detention and “0” otherwise. Outcomes: Markers of Adulthood. Markers of adulthood were from data collected at two study points (15 and 16 years postpartum), when participants were on average 32 and 33 years old. Marital status during adulthood was created by aggregating respondents’ marital status: Being married at either of these two study points was coded as “1” and “0” otherwise.A measure of large family size (more than four live births) by age 25 was coded as “1” and “0” otherwise. As measures for education attainment during adulthood, two variables were identified: (1) attending any postsecondary educational institute and (2) attending a college. Both measures were dichotomous and scored as “1” for positive responses and “0” otherwise. Economic hardship was scored as “1” for being less than 1.85 in income-to-needs ratios at the last study point and “0” otherwise. Income-to-needs ratios were calculated by comparing annual household income to the poverty threshold for the corresponding year. Households with income-to-needs ratios below 1.00 are classified as “poor,” and those below 1.85 are classified as “near poor” (Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, & Maritato, 1997). In the present study, an income-to-needs ratio of 1.85 was chosen to reflect our interest in general financial status and not extreme financial deprivation.We also note that this measure is different from financial dependence previously defined among the longitudinal demographic markers; economic hardship does not necessarily indicate reliance on public assistance as the primary income source.Adulthood labor force participation reflected respondents’ involvement in full-time work at either of the last two study points. It was scored as “1” for positive responses and “0” otherwise. Statistical Analysis
To assess the impact of timing of accomplishment of adult transition tasks, we evaluated logistic regressions separately for each adult outcome. We created a series of dummy variables for basic education completion and earlier labor force participation.
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sion parameters and standard errors were combined using proc MI in SAS version 9.1.
The reference category for basic education was ontime completion; for early labor force participation, the reference category was employment before age 20. Because we had several predictors and outcomes, we reduced the model in a systematic fashion as suggested by Hosmer and Lemeshow (2000); first, we conducted bivariate tests of predictors for each of the markers of adulthood, and we retained significant predictors (p < .10) for the multivariate analysis. The percentage of missingness in the data ranged from 5.2% to 13.4%, depending on measures. For all logistic regression analyses, missing data were managed via multiple imputation (MI), which has been widely evaluated as an advanced statistical tool to handle missingness with less bias than traditional methods of handling missing data, such as listwise deletion (Schafer & Graham, 2002). Using the PAN imputation function in R, five separate data sets were imputed. The imputation models included demographic markers; time invariant predictors, such as age at the first birth; and time invariant markers of adulthood, such as economic hardship at the last study point. Race was included in the imputation model with a dummy-coded indicator (1= person of color, 0 = white person). All multivariate regres-
Results
Demographic Markers of Adult Status from Pregnancy to 16 Years Postpartum
To provide important descriptive data on this diverse, nonclinical sample of adolescent mothers over time, the demographic markers of adult status from pregnancy through 16 years postpartum were graphed. The proportion of respondents who had public assistance as their primary income source, were married, had graduated from high school, had furthered their education post high school, and were employed from pregnancy of target child (at average age 16.6 years) to 16 years postpartum (at average age 32.8 years) is presented in Figure 1. In contrast to the public perception of adolescent mothers, there was a steady decrease in the percentage of public assistance reliance and an increase in employment. At the pregnancy interview, 41% were dependent on welfare; welfare dependence steadily grew to 62% at 3.5 years postpartum (average age 20.5) and then decreased every year thereafter. This trend in the usage of public assistance was interwoven with
Figure 1. Descriptive Data of Life Course Events/ Status of Adolescent Mothers over Time 0.9 0.8 Public Assistance Married High School Post-HS Employed
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(1
15
(3
0
(3
0.0
Years Postpartum (Average Age in Years)
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the steady increase in attainment of a high school diploma or GED and employment. By 16 years postpartum, respondents were, on average, 32.8 years of age, and 83% had graduated from high school or received their GED. During target pregnancy, none of the respondents were married; marriage rates slowly increased, peaking at 41% at 15 years postpartum. Impact of Timing of Accomplishment of Adult Transition Tasks on Adult Status Outcomes
Next, we considered the association between the timing of transitional milestones and multiple longterm adult outcomes. Means and standard deviations of the antecedents outcomes measured for this study are presented in Table 1. Logistic Regression for Each Outcome
Marital Status. The odds ratios—that is, the exponentials of the corresponding coefficients—are reported in Table 2.Young women who graduated from high school or earned a GED by the age of 19
were 1.88 (1/.53) times more likely to be married during adulthood, as compared with those who accomplished this adult transitional task at ages older than 19.The more separations from the study child young women experienced, the less likely they were to be involved in a marital relationship during adulthood—the odds of being married decreased by .88 with one unit increase in the number of separations from the study child. Number of Births. Those with delayed high school graduation or GED (at ages older than 19) were 1.95 times more likely to give birth more than four times, as compared with those who completed their basic education by age 19. Compared with those who completed their basic education by age 19, women without a high school diploma or GED were 2.65 times more likely to have more than four births. We also found that as age of first birth increased, there was a lower odds (.66) of four or more births by age 32.8. Economic Hardship. We found a statistically significant association between earlier financial dependence and economic hardship in adulthood.
Table 1: Descriptive Data on Independent and Dependent Variables Mean or Variable Proportion
Independent Grandmother graduated from high school Age at first birth Earlier financial dependence Detention by age 18 Number of children by age 25 Separations from study child by age 25 Basic education completion High school graduation by age 19 High school graduation after age 19 No high school graduation or GED Earlier labor force participation Employed by age 20 Employed after age 20 Never employed Dependent Married during adulthood Adulthood labor force participation More than four live births Ever attended college Ever attended any postsecondary education Economic hardship: Below 1.85 income-to-needs ratio
.71 16.64 .42 .19 2.5 1.85
SD Range
.45 1.20 .50 .39 .99 3.33
0 – 1 13 – 19 0 – 1 0 – 1 1 – 5 0 – 12
.49 .50 .46 .29 .45 .50
0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1 0 – 1
.53 .33 .14 .69 .27 .03 .39 .53 .31 .09 .72 .46
Note: This table is based on nonimputed data.
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Table 2: Logistic Regression Results (Odds Ratios) Dependent Variables Ever any More than Postsecondary Ever Economic Labor Force Four Live Independent Variable Education College Hardship Participation Marriage Births
Grandmother graduated from high school Age at first birth Earlier financial dependence Number of births by age 25 Adolescent detention Separations from study child by age 25 Basic education completiona High school graduation or GED after age 19 No high school graduation or GED Earlier labor force participationb Employed after age 20 Never employed
2.01† 1.3 — — .74 —
— — — .59† — —
— — 2.64* — — —
— — — — .64 —
— — — — .86 .89*
.59 .66* — — — 1.08†
.28* .06*
.15* .00*
1.79† 1.62
.51* .22*
.53* .94
1.95 2.65†
— —
— —
— —
— —
— —
— —
Note: Dashes mean excluded in the model-building process for the corresponding outcome. a The reference group = high school graduation or GED by age 19. b The reference group = employed by age 20. † < .10. *p < .05.
Discussion
Those exposed to earlier extreme economic adversity were 2.64 times more likely to experience adulthood economic hardship, as compared with those who were not. Similarly, those who had delayed educational attainment were 1.79 times more likely to experience economic hardship in adulthood. Education. It is not surprising that the timing of basic education completion was associated with the pursuit of postsecondary education. When young women finished high school at ages older than 19, the odds of any postsecondary education and college dropped by .28 and .15, respectively. In other words, those who completed their basic education by age 19 were about six times (1/.15) more likely to attend college and 3.6 times (1/.28) more likely to pursue any education beyond high school. Number of births before age 25 was negatively associated with attending college—a one unit increase in number of births before age 25 resulted in a decrease in the odds of attending college by .59. Employment. Those who completed basic education by age 19 were about two times (1/.51) more likely to engage in full-time employment than were those who completed basic education at ages older than 19 and were 4.55 times (1/.22) more likely to be employed with a full-time job than were those without a high school diploma or GED.
Descriptively, the results show that over time the vast majority of adolescent mothers gained a high school level of education. Similarly, marriage increased steadily over time, but no more than 41% of the sample at any one time reported being married. In addition, dependence on public assistance increased gradually during the first 3.5 years postpartum, then steadily decreased until the last two waves of data, where there was a slight increase in the use of public assistance when the women were in their early 30s. Employment increased over time, with an average of 60% employed between ages 26 and 32. The study provides partial support for the hypothesis that that there is a domain-specific effect of earlier problems in one area related to later outcomes in the same area, as we expected. However, with the exception of high school completion, there did not appear to be cross-over effects to other domains of adult outcomes. For example, economic hardship was predicted by earlier dependence on public benefits and only marginally by high school graduation after age 19. The likelihood of any postsecondary education was less for those who postponed high school education until after age 19 or who did not graduate; grandmothers’ high school education was marginally associated with any postsecondary education. In this analysis, separation from child
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was marginally related to having more than four live births and significantly related to a lower likelihood of marriage. Consequently, this is an area for further exploration. Although there are multiple reasons for separation from the target child—some of which would be positive—in the aggregate, this variable appears to tap potential difficulty during the transition into adulthood, pointing to family composition and size. In addition, separations should be assessed relative to child outcomes; clearly, if separations are due to instability within the family environment, then a relationship with adjustment problems for the child might be expected in the larger context of risk. Contrary to our hypothesis, early labor force participation was not related to later employment status or any of the other measurements of adult attainment. Although the vast majority of adolescent mothers had been employed by age 20, the typically low-level jobs they held probably did not give them the opportunity to access resources to enhance their transition into adulthood. Our findings suggest that promoting early work experiences for young mothers will not ensure financial independence in early adulthood or provide support for attainment of other markers of adulthood. It is possible that some types of jobs and employment settings would provide more opportunities for growth than others; more research in this area would be informative. The logistic regression results suggest that timing of high school completion is important for adolescent mothers; as expected, delay in high school completion past age 19 or no high school education was related to a lower probability of fulltime employment and achieving any postsecondary education. Similarly, participants’ completion of a high school education after age 19 was also related to a lower probability of being married during their early 30s relative to completing high school by age 19, whereas not having a high school education was unrelated to later likelihood of marriage. Only delayed high school education was related to economic hardship relative to completing high school by age 19; “no high school completion” did not predict economic status at 16 years postpartum. As noted, we explored why lack of high school completion was not related in the way we had expected, and we concluded that it was highly correlated with early cumulative economic hardship, and so it essentially was the first event in a series of events that foretold the long-term outcomes for adolescent mothers.
The most striking outcome of this study was the pervasive influence of the timing of high school completion on the adolescent mothers’ transition into adulthood. Although most studies have examined education more generally, we were interested in whether the timing of the completion of high school or GED was relevant to long-term outcomes. The timing of high school education was the only variable that was relevant to all of the adult outcomes, highlighting the importance of on-time high school completion for adolescent mothers. This is important because earlier studies have shown that adolescent mothers typically take longer to achieve certain adult statuses (such as school completion) because they take on the role of parent, which often supersedes other roles or makes it difficult to balance multiple roles (Whitman, Borkowski, Keogh, & Weed, 2001). Both later high school completion and no high school completion were risk factors for adult outcomes. Two important issues should be addressed given the results of this study. First, why was on-time high school completion protective compared with high school completion after age 19? It may be that being on-track with respect to age-graded opportunity structures are important; finishing high school during the teenage years may open up access to other resources, such as school-based support for college entrance (including community college), job fairs for entry-level positions, access to job preparation resources, and age-graded entry-level positions.The second issue is to consider what factors contribute to on-time completion of high school. Although we know that poverty predicts dropout rates for adolescent mothers (Upchurch, 1993), we know less about what predicts on-time completion. It may be that there are personal characteristics that differentiate between those who finish on time and those who do not or those who drop out. Leadbeater (1996) found that adolescent mothers’ delayed grade placement (an indication of school problems or retention) was the strongest predictor of graduation status at three years postpartum. Although early academic performance may be important, alternative hypotheses should be examined. It is possible that those who finish their basic education also have additional supports, either through school or family, that enable them to stay in school during adolescence. Leadbeater (1996) found that adolescent mothers who stayed in school or returned after the birth reported that they had help with child care, whereas those who dropped
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out prior to or after pregnancy reported less help. Finally, there may be contextual influences such as in the socioeconomic status of the family of origin, instrumental and emotional support from extended family, or resources available within the community. Upchurch (1993) found that female adolescents who dropped out of school prior to becoming adolescent mothers were the most disadvantaged. More research is needed to understand the factors that promote on-time high school completion for adolescent mothers and identification of the mechanisms of high school completion responsible for producing the relationship between on-time school completion and adulthood outcomes. The findings regarding education suggest that policy and services that enable young mothers to complete their education in a timely fashion are essential for long-term adult outcomes. The passage of the Educational Amendments of 1972 and Title IX (U.S. Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, 1991) made it possible for pregnant students (regardless of marital status) to have equal access to education; however, this mandate did not include requirements for additional services that enable pregnant students to remain in school. As Dellinger (2004) argued, there is very little comprehensive support and great variability in school administrative behavior regarding pregnant students; for example, she noted that New York had numerous complaints that schools “pushed out,” “counseled out,” or “eased out” pregnant adolescents. Title IX mandates that schools receiving federal funding may not discriminate or exclude any student from educational services and programs due to pregnancy or childbirth. However, there are often underlying behaviors of individual schools that make it difficult for pregnant students to remain in school, such as discouraging pregnant teenagers from staying in their current school or refusing to provide make-up homework to adolescents recovering from childbirth (New York Civil Liberties Union, 2000). Although less is said in Title IX about parenting students, U.S. and state constitutional principles would protect parenting adolescents’ rights to equal education (Dellinger, 2004). Although there are several models of school-based programs, both within mainstream schools and in schools specially designed to serve pregnant and parenting teenagers, schools are generally not required to provide services that would enable young women to remain in school and graduate on time. Consequently, school-based
social workers are in a uniquely important position to work within the system by supporting access to educational opportunities and advocate for pregnant and parenting adolescents. Social workers, unlike most teachers, are able to access resources for students outside of school through multiple service systems to support adolescent mothers. In addition, as advocates, social workers can intercede on the behalf of adolescent mothers within the school system by supporting flexible administrative policies that support the unique needs of parenting students. Notably, maternal education is related to positive parenting practices (Luster & Su Min Oh, 2004) and improved child outcomes (Whitman et al., 2001), so intervention to ensure continued access to education should produce positive outcomes for both mother and child. As with all studies, the findings of this study need to be considered in context. This study was not based on a random sample; conclusions regarding outcomes should be viewed in the context of this regional sample based on the demographic distributions noted. In addition, some of the measures have limitations and should be considered carefully. It should be noted that although grandmother’s education is an indicator of the family of origin’s socioeconomic status, it does not assess the poverty status of the family; because of data limitations, it was necessary to rely on this one measure. Similarly, our early measure of economic insecurity is limited because we did not have income-to-needs ratios in the early years, and we could only analyze use of public assistance. To improve adult outcomes for adolescent mothers, additional research and policy assessment should focus on barriers preventing adolescent mothers from remaining in school and individual and community factors that contribute to school success and on-time graduation for young mothers. In addition, assumptions about the reasons adolescent mothers leave school should be explored with greater attention to formal and informal structural barriers (Dellinger, 2004).
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Wald, M. (2005). Foreword. In W. Osgood, M. Foster, C. Flanagan, & G. Ruth (Eds.), On your own without a net:The transition to adulthood for vulnerable populations (p. vii). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Weed, K., Keogh, D., & Borkowski. (2000). Predictors of resiliency in adolescent mothers. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 21, 207–231. Whitman, T., Borkowski, J., Keogh, D., & Weed, K. (2001). Interwoven lives: Adolescent mothers and their children. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Monica L. Oxford, PhD, is research associate professor, School of Social Work, University of Washington; Jungeun O. Lee, PhD, is a research scientist, School of Social Work, University of Washington; and Mary Jane Lohr, MS, is a research scientist, School of Social Work, University of Washington, Seattle. This research was funded by NIDA grant R01 DA05208 to Lewayne Gilchrist. Send correspondence to Monica Oxford, School of SocialWork, University of Washington, 4101 15th Avenue NE, Seattle,WA 98105; e-mail: [email protected]. Original manuscript received April 26, 2008 Final revision received January 6, 2009 Accepted January 26, 2009
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